Table 3. Effect of environmental conditions on seedling emergence percentage (EP) and emergence index (EI) of 10 alfalfa seed lots.

Seed lot	Control		Water stress		Salinity stress
	EP (%)	EI	EP (%)	EI	EP (%)	EI
1	93.33 ± 2.40 Aa	7.15 ± 0.85 Aa	42.00 ± 2.00 Bab	1.64 ± 0.20 Ba	41.33 ± 4.67 Ba	1.38 ± 0.17 Ba
2	74.67 ± 7.68 Ab	4.25 ± 0.70 Abc	36.67 ± 0.67 Bb	1.36 ± 0.11 Ba	27.33 ± 2.67 Bb	0.87 ± 0.07 Bcd
3	54.67 ± 2.67 Ac	2.73 ± 0.46 Ac	23.33 ± 2.40 Bc	0.78 ± 0.06 Bb	16.67 ± 1.76 Bc	0.48 ± 0.03 Bd
4	90.00 ± 5.29 Aab	5.66 ± 0.74 Aab	42.67 ± 3.53 Bab	1.85 ± 0.31 Ba	36.00 ± 3.06 Bab	1.34 ± 0.19 Bab
5	85.33 ± 5.46 Aab	5.25 ± 0.39 Aab	46.00 ± 3.06 Ba	1.86 ± 0.13 Ba	32.00 ± 1.16 Cab	1.12 ± 0.02 Babc
6	90.67 ± 3.33Aa	6.49 ± 0.86 Aa	42.67 ± 2.67 Bab	1.90 ± 0.20 Ba	34.67 ± 3.53 Bab	1.40 ± 0.16 Ba
7	87.33 ± 1.76 Aab	5.57 ± 0.23 Aab	38.67 ± 2.91 Bab	1.48 ± 0.01 Ba	37.33 ± 2.40 Bab	1.30 ± 0.11 Bab
8	81.33 ± 7.33 Aab	4.02 ± 0.50 Abc	46.00 ± 4.00 Ba	1.63 ± 0.25 Ba	29.33 ± 4.06 Bb	0.93 ± 0.07 Bbc
9	88.00 ± 4.00 Aab	5.44 ± 0.42 Aab	40.67 ± 2.91 Bab	1.54 ± 0.07 Ba	28.00 ± 2.31 Cb	0.94 ± 0.12 Bbc
10	88.67 ± 3.33 Aab	5.70 ± 0.62 Aab	43.33 ± 1.33 Bab	1.69 ± 0.11 Ba	32.67 ± 3.71 Bab	1.15 ± 0.21 Babc
Source of variation		DF	EP		EI
			Chisq	P	Chisq	P
Seed lot (SL)		9	109.933	<0.001	137.120	<0.001
Environmental conditions (EC)		2	73.432	<0.001	182.878	<0.001
SL × EC		18	36.683	0.006	64.685	<0.001

Note:

Different uppercase indicated significant difference among different stress treatments for given seed lot at the 0.05 level (P < 0.05), different lowercase indicated significant difference among different seed lots for given stress treatment at the 0.05 level (P < 0.05). The effect of seed lot and environmental conditions on seedling emergence percentage and emergence index were analyzed using generalized linear mixed models. Three replications for each treatment of each seed lot. Duncan’s test was used to compare means when significant differences were found.