EFFECT OF SALINITY AND WATERLOGGING ON GROWTH AND SURVIVAL OF SALICORNIA-EUROPAEA L, AN INLAND HALOPHYTE

Salicornia europaea seedlings were exposed to various salinity and wat er depths for 11 weeks under controlled, growth chamber conditions. We ekly measurements were made of height, number of nodes, and number of branches per plant. Growth and survival of plants grown with the addit ion of NaCl were significantly greater (P <0.0001) than for plants whi ch were not given a salt treatment. Although there were no significant (P >0.05) growth differences among plants under different water level conditions within the salt treatment group, plants which were grown w ithout NaCl demonstrated significant decreases in growth in higher wat er levels, with the greatest growth occurring in the low water treatme nt group. All plants given a salt treatment survived until the end of the experiment. However, high mortality occurred among the plants that were not salt-treated, with all plants grown under waterlogged condit ions dying by week six. The high mortality exhibited by this treatment group indicates that Salicornia which is typically found in low marsh or inland salt marsh situations, was unable to overcome the combined stress of being continuously waterlogged in a freshwater environment.