Hard seededness in khesari (Lathyrus sativus) germplasm

Hardseededness is widely known in pulses and affects gennination counts in field and laboratory conditions. The critical evaluation of hardseeds in 1,279 accesions of Lathyrus salivus indicated considerable variation for hardseed percentage in the accessions tested. The role of environment in causing hardseededness in this crop was also noted. Mechanical scarification with fine sand paper proved to be an effective method of removing seed coat impenneability to ensure the water uptake in order to record the actual germination percentage of gennplasm accessions, which is a pre-requisite for their Iongtenn conservation in the National Genebank.