Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-15T01:49:44.205Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Improvement of carrot crop establishment by combining seed treatments with increased seed-bed moisture availability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2009

W. E. Finch-Savage  and
W. G. Pill
W. E. Finch-Savage
Affiliation:
AFRC Institute of Horticultural Research, Wellesbourne, Warwick CV35 9EF, UK
W. G. Pill
Affiliation:
AFRC Institute of Horticultural Research, Wellesbourne, Warwick CV35 9EF, UK
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

In studies of carrots sown on three dates at Wellesbourne in 1986, mean time to seedling emergence and spread of times to seedling emergence of untreated and fluid-drilled seeds increased as seed-bed moisture at sowing decreased. These differences were not observed with irrigation before sowing.

Osmotic priming increased the percentage of seeds with emerged radicles at the time of fluid drilling from 17% in the untreated control to 56%. Irrespective of seed-bed moisture, time to emergence was shorter from primed germinating seeds than from germinating seeds, both treatments giving earlier seedling emergence than untreated seeds. Seedling shoot weight was greater from treated than from untreated seeds.

Seed-bed characteristics on unirrigated plots had no effect on seedling emergence when soil moisture was adequate but, where soil moisture was limiting, rolling the seed bed to increase capillarity resulted in 79% emergence compared with the 67% average from seed beds that were not rolled. Application of a soil conditioner to stabilize the seed-bed surface structure generally improved emergence when rain fell soon after sowing. The results suggested that a combination of seed-bed and seed treatments can significantly improve the predictability of crop establishment of carrots on different dates.

Type
Crops and Soils
Information
The Journal of Agricultural Science , Volume 115 , Issue 1 , August 1990 , pp. 75 - 81
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Currah, I. E., Gray, D. & Thomas, T. H. (1974). The sowing of germinating vegetable seeds using a fluid drill. Annals of Applied Biology 95, 261–266.Google Scholar
Finch-Savage, W. E. (1984). The effects of fluid drilling germinating seeds on the emergence and subseque t growth of carrots in the field. Journal of Horticultural Science 59, 411–417.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Finch-Savage, W. E. (1986). Effects of soil moisture and temperature on seedling emergence from natural and pregerminated onion seeds. Journal of Agricultural Science, Cambridge 107, 249–256.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Finch-Savage, W. E. (1987). Some effects of seed bed conditions on seedling establishment from fluid drilled pre-germinated seed. Acta Horticulturae 198, 277–286.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gray, D., Brocklehurst, P. A., Steckel, J. R. A. & Dearman, J. (1984). Priming and pre-germination of parsnip (Pastinaca sativa L.) seed. Journal of Horticultural Science 59, 101–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hakansson, I. & von Polgar, J. (1984). Experiments on the effects of seedbed characteristics on seedling emergence in a dry weather situation. Soil and Tillage Research 4, 115–135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hegarty, T. W. & Royle, S. M. (1978). Soil impedance as a factor reducing crop seedling emergence, and its relation to soil conditions at sowing, and to applied water. Journal of Applied Ecology 15, 897–904.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Michel, B. E. & Kaufmann, M. R. (1973). The osmotic potential of polyethylene glycol 6000. Plant Physiology 51, 914–916.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
North, P. F. (1987). Effect of contrasting tillage procedures on the emergence of onions in relation to measured physical properties of seed beds. Journal of Agricultural Science, Cambridge 108, 671–680.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Orchard, T. J. (1977). Estimating the parameters of plant seedling emergence. Seed Science and Technology 5, 61–69.Google Scholar
Page, E. R. (1984). Overcoming capping problems with synthetic soil conditioners. Aspects of Applied Biology 7, 287–297.Google Scholar
Pill, W. G. & Finch-Savage, W. E. (1988). Effects of combining priming and plant growth regulator treatments on the synchronisation of carrot seed germination. Annals of Applied Biology 113, 383–389.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rowse, H. R., Stone, D. A. & Goodman, D. (1985). Soil cultivation: seed bed cultivations. Annual Report for 1984, National Vegetable Research Station, pp. 128–130.Google Scholar
Salter, P. J. & Darby, R. J. (1976). Synchronisation of germination of celery seeds. Annals of Applied Biology 84, 415–424.CrossRefGoogle Scholar