Abstract

Seed priming is a technique by which the seeds of the conditions before getting on their bed and ecological environment in terms of physiological and biochemical readiness to receive germination. Experiment was conducted using a completely randomized design in summer 2015 in rangeland laboratory– University of Mohaghegh Ardebili. Treatments include: osmopriming (primed with KNO3 with the Concentration of 0.3 and 0.2 %), hormopriming (primed with GA3 with the concentration of 500 and 1000 ppm) and control (distilled water). Drought stress was applied by using solution of PEG-6000 with three levels of 0, -6 and -12 bar. Analysis of variance showed that the osmopriming and hormopriming treatments and levels of drought stress had significant difference (p<0.01) on germination and early seedling growth of F. ovina in germination percentage, germination rate, root and shoot length, vigor index, allometric coefficient and mean germination time. In general, osmopriming had more desirable performance compared with hormopriming and control. Except allometric coefficient in other Indicators, NO3 0.2 % in drought 0, has had the most impact on germination and early growth of these species.