Variation in spike initiation in some Piper longum germplasms of North East India

Abstract

The risk of adverse reactions in herbal remedies is less and has become popular to be used traditionally for treating various diseases. The species associated with genus Piper are important medicinal plants used for preparation of herbal medicines. The present investigation was carried out in the Experimental farm, Department of Horticulture, Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat-13 during 2013-14 and 2014-15 to investigate the flowering variation of some Piper longum germplasms of North East India. A total of 16 Piper longum germplasms including ‘Viswam’ as check variety were evaluated and experimental data revealed significant difference in spike initiation time among the germplasms with shortest spike initiation period (245.30 days) that recorded in germplasm PLJ-19 while the check var. recorded 287.40 days. Significant and shortest period for spike initiation to maturity was recorded in germplasm PLJ-19 (61.04days) followed by PLJ-01 (61.00days), PLJ-11 (61.38days) and check var. (70.03days).The number of flowering spike per plant ranges in between 58.53-113.73. The highest number of flowering spike per plant 113.73 was observed in germplasm PLJ-19 followed by PLJ-01 (109.40), PLJ-11 (104.11), PLJ-16 (100.33) and were found to be superior over check var. (92.07). The present findings has a significant contribution in determination and identification of germplasm having shorter spike formation period with higher number of flowering spike as the variation in piperine content depends on both the characters also.