Treating corn seeds with fish protein fertilizer can increase the rate of seed germination and seedling survival, and relieve the inhibition of salt stress during the seeds germination period. Salt stress has an obvious inhibitory effect on seed germination and seedling growth of sweet waxy corn.
Foliar spraying of fish protein fertilizer significantly increased the chlorophyll content and antioxidant enzyme activity of seedling leaves under salt stress. The MDA content significantly reduced and greatly improved the adaptability of corn seedlings to salt stress.
Promote Germination of Seeds
The germination rate, germination vigor, and germination index of sweet waxy corn seeds decreased significantly under salt stress. After treating the corn seeds with fish protein fertilizer, the germination rate, germination potential, and germination index of the seeds increased first and then decreased.
The germination rate, germination vigor, and germination index were 47.17%, 51.16%, and 64.15% higher than that of the CK group.
Promote Sprout and Root Length of Seedlings
The shoot length, root length, shoot fresh weight, root fresh weight, shoot dry weight and root dry weight of maize seedlings were significantly reduced under the salt stress.
After soaking the corn seeds with fish protein fertilizer, the effect of alleviating salt stress is significant. The shoot length, root length, shoot fresh quality, root fresh quality, shoot dry quality and root dry quality of seedlings increased by 77.29%, 81.37%, and 88.66%, 36.40%, 61.54%, 113.79% compared to the CK group.
Promote Chlorophyll Content of Seedlings
The content of chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b, and chlorophyll a+b of the maize seedling leaves were significantly decreased under salt stress.
However, at the same time of salt stress, foliar spraying of fish protein fertilizer on the leaf surface increased the contents of chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b, and chlorophyll a+b of corn seedling leaves in different degrees. The content of chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b, and chlorophyll a+b of maize seedling leaves increased by 31.84%, 84.38%, 52.08% compared with the CK group.
Promote Seedling Antioxidant Enzyme Activity
Under the salt stress, the activities of SOD, POD, and CAT in the maize seedling leaves were significantly reduced, which were reduced by 52.97%, 58.06%, and 50.07% compared with the control group.
After treated with fish protein fertilizer on corn seedling leaves, the SOD, POD, and CAT activities of the seedling leaves were significantly increased by 70.11%, 73.08%, and 38.12%.
Conclusion
The conclusion can be obtained according to the above experiment that fish protein fertilizer can effectively reduce the inhibitory effect of salt stress on corn seed germination and seedling biomass accumulation, increase seed germination rate and promote seedling growth.