Department of Agricultural, Microbiology Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore-641 003 (Tamil Nadu), India.
The effect of herbicides viz., anilofos, butachlor and thiobencarb on Azolla hybrids viz., AHCI, AH-C2, AH-C3 and AH-C4 and wild cultures of A. filiculoides and A. microphylla was investigated under in vitro condition. Application of herbicides in general reduced the growth and biomass production of Azolla cultures. However, the hybrid AH-C2 showed relatively better tolerance to all the herbicides upto 0.5 ppm concentration by recording higher growth rate and better biomass production. Among the herbicides, anilofos was less inhibitory than butachlor and thiobencarb. Herbicides concentration above 1 ppm adversely affected the growth and biomass production of Azolla hybrids.
