Physiochemical Studies in Seedlings of Teak (Tectona grandis Linn. f.) of North East India in Relation to Drought Resistance for Selection of Improved Germplasm

The global climate change is occurring at an unpredictable rate, where periods of drought are predicted to be extremely severe. The drought tolerance in Teak (Tectona grandis Linn. f.) accessions; collected from North East India was screened under water stress conditions created by reducing irrigation doses. Parameters targeted for screening were vegetative growth, physiological parameters and chemical constituents of leaves. Water stress treatment revealed that plant height, leaves number/plant, average leaf area, N, P, K, Ca, Cl and Na content were significantly decreased by increasing the level of water stress conditions in all studied accessions. Variations in the physiological parameters among different accessions may be due to different intensities of natural selection acting upon the traits in their natural habitat. The aim of the study was to determine source variation in Tectona grandis Linn. f. accessions collected from 41 locations of North East India and to identify the best sources to be utilised for reforestation and further genetic improvement work. In our study, three promising drought tolerant accessions were screened in a decreasing order of drought tolerance viz. GKU-24, GKU-37 and BNU-10 whereas; the drought stress had the most adverse effect on ASM-124 and LUT-45.