Effect of pre-sowing seed treatment, type of seed beds and time of sowing on Terminalia chebula in its natural forest

Harar, Terminalia chebula Retz is an important medicinal tree species in the Asian countries. Large scale planting programme for the species is often difficult due to its poor seed germination and longer germination period in the natural forests. This study describes the effect of various pre-sowing treatments, bed types and sowing times on seed germination and seedling growth of Harar. Under various integration effects germination ranged from 9.17 to 40.00 per cent, germination energy from 5.00 to 20.33, time taken for germination from 26.83 to 31.50 days, shoot length from 4.60 to 6.77 cm, root length from 4.77 to 7.30 cm, number of leaves per seedling from 3.00 to 4.67, rootshoot ratio from 0.88 to 1.35 and total dry biomass per seedling from 1.27 to 2.03 g. However the combined interaction effect of pre-sowing treatments, bed types and sowing times treatments on these characters was found to be non-significant. At the same time the two factor combination of the treatments was found to significant in certain cases. Considering the early establishment and fast regeneration of Harar in natural forest, the best pretreatment, bed type and sowing time in this study was scarification of hard seed coat, Raking + FYM @ 2 kg per square meter and July, respectivelywhich may be useful for further expansion of Harar plantations.