It is well known that drought-induced stress negatively impacts physiological and morphological properties of plants. In this study our aim was to determine the effects of drought on barley and if application of silicon fertilizer at different growth stages alleviates drought stress. Silicon was applied at three stages. Firstly, before the emergence of flag leaf. Then prior to the grain filling phase. Finally, at the start of the grain filling phase.We measured physiological and biochemichal properties, number of trichomes on the upper and lower epidermis, optical properties of barley and content of accessible silicon in soil. In this study it is shown that drought stress negatively impacts potential and effective photochemichal efficiency, stomatal conductance, content of photosynthethic pigments, content of anthocyanins and reflective and transmissive properties of barley leaves. Application of silicon fertilizer did not alleviate drought stress, however, differences in reflective properties were detected between application of silicon at different growth stages. Application of silicon between flag leaf emergence and filling of grains had a better effect on reflectance of photosynthetthically active radiation compared to the other two growth stages. Application of silicon before flag leaf emergence increased reflectance of UV radiation from barley leaves. It is also possible that the concentration of silicon in the soil was such that differences when adding additional silicon were negligible.
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