*3.1. The Effect of Different Treatments on Final Germination Percentage of S. aralocaspica Seeds*

Ethanol time and pH had no significant effect on the germination of dimorphic seeds (*p* > 0.05). Secondary disinfectant type (*p* < 0.001), secondary disinfectant time (*p* < 0.001), and seed type (*p* < 0.001) significantly affected the seed germination percentage (Table 2). Compared with the seeds without sterilization treatment (Figure S1), the NaClO treatment did not affect the germination percentage of *S. aralocaspica* seeds. With the increase in the sterilization time duration of 0.1% HgCl2, the germination percentage of brown seeds decreased significantly. The germination percentage of black seeds was low under all treatments and the highest germination percentage was only 16.67%.

**Table 2.** A mixed model ANOVA on final germination percentage of dimorphic seeds of *Suaeda aralocaspica*.


When 3.6% NaClO was used, the germination percentages of brown seeds in treatment N11, N15, N16, N17 were 100%, and the germination percentage of other treatments, except N5 and N21, was ≥90% (Table 3). The germination percentages of black seeds in treatment n10 and n23 were the highest (16.67%). When 0.1% HgCl2 was used, the germination percentage of brown seeds in treatment H1 and H7 was the highest (93.33%). The germination percentage of brown seeds in the other groups was from 20% to 90%. In contrast, black seeds did not germinate under many treatments. The highest germination percentage of treatment h13 was only 13.33%, and the other groups were less than 10%. The toxicity of 3.6% NaClO on seed germination of *S. aralocaspica* was lower than that of 0.1% HgCl2.


**Table 3.** Final germination percentages of *Suaeda aralocaspica* seeds cultured with different treatments after 20 days incubation.

Different lowercase letters in each column indicate significant differences among different treatments; different uppercase letters indicate significant difference between dimorphic seeds treated with the same secondary disinfectant.
