Effect of salt tolerant Bacillus sp. and Pseudomonas sp. on wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) growth under soil salinity: A comparative study

This study was conducted to examine the comparative effect on wheat plant health inoculated with the two different rhizobacterial strains Bacillus sp. (JG3) and Pseudomonas sp. (JG7) under soil salinity. Total seven potential salt tolerant strains were isolated from the saline soils of BBAU-Lucknow. The bacterial strains have been investigated for nitrogen fixation, phosphate solubilization, ammonia, indole acetic acid and hydrogen cyanide production activities. Based on morphological and biochemical activities the strains JG3 was designated as Bacillus sp. and the strain JG7 was designated as Pseudomonas sp. Both the strains witness positive for the different plant growth promoting traits. In comparison of strain JG7, strain JG3 inoculated wheat seeds enhance plant height by 32.32%, root length by 37.84%, fresh weight by 28.2% and dry weight by 15.51% in FYM amended soils. We observe in this study that seeds treated with Bacillus sp. found significantly effective in plant growth promotion compared to Pseudomonas sp. in saline soil. Based on the comparative experimental study reported herein, it is pointedly observed that the use of salt tolerant PGPRs are effective for facilitating plant health in salt stress environments.