Department of Botany, Moi UniversityP.O. Box 3900 Eldoret, Kenya
A study was carried out to assess the effect of salt stress on two high yielding cultivars of figer millet (Eleusine coracana Gaertn); ‘Enakuru composite’ and ‘Ekalakala-1’. The shed-grown plants were treated to irrigation salinity levels of 1.0 (control), 40, 8.0 and 12.0 mmho cm-1 (B.C.) in free draining loam soil. In the sixth week after sowing, the main tillers were assessed for leaf water potential, transpiration and photosynthetic rates, the chlorophyll concentration and resistance to water vapour transfer. All the parameters were adversely affected by salt stress in both cultivars. However, the two cultivars did not suffer death at 12 mmho cm-1 salinity level, which puts them among the moderately salt resistant crops such as barley. Intercultivar comparisons showed that Enakuru tended to respond more drastically to salt stress than Ekalakala-1.
