Seed vigor and performance of maize plants in the field / Vigor de sementes e desempenho de plantas na cultura de milho

AUTOR(ES)

Vitor Henrique Vaz Mondo

DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

2010

RESUMO

High physiological potential seeds allow faster seedling emergence and higher plant initial growth than low physiological potential seeds. Within plant populations, the uneven seedling emergence could affect plant competitive ability for resources (light, water and soil nutrients) and have direct effects on plant grain yield and population grain yield. Therefore, the objective of this research was to study the effects of using seed lots constituted by high vigor seeds or low vigor seeds, as well as their mixtures, simulating seed lots homogeneous and heterogeneous on seed vigor, on plant performances and crop performances. A two-year experiment was developed from November 2006 to June 2008, using two seed lots of maize hybrid seeds (DOW 8480), previously characterized as high vigor and low vigor, on seven different seed distributions on the sowing row, at proportions of 100/0, 75/25, 66/33, 50/50, 33/66, 25/75 and 0/100 of high vigor and low seed vigor seeds, respectively. The plants of different vigor levels and positions in the sowing row were evaluated by plant height, stem diameter and leaf area index at development stages of four and eight leaves. At harvest, dry mass accumulation, number of grains per row, number of rows per ear, thousand grain mass and grain yield were also evaluated. It was observed that plants originated from low vigor seeds had inferior initial growth than plants originated from high vigor seeds and it had intensified the irregularity of plant population resulting on lower competitive ability for these plants. On uniform plant populations (homogeneous seed lots) seed vigor effects decreased with plant development stages succession, disappearing until harvest, however, on irregular plant populations (heterogeneous seed lots), it persisted until harvest. Also, individual plants originated from high vigor seeds showed dominant effects on plants originated from low vigor seeds, but did not show compensatory effects and the losses resultant from the intra-specific competition increase affected negatively plant population yield. Therefore, the uneven seedling emergence, caused by seed vigor heterogeneity, results on dominated plants, which are originated from low vigor seeds, with lower productivity and are responsible for plant population yield losses.

ASSUNTO(S)

milho plants competition grãos - produção plant growth grain production sementes - vigor. maize seeds - vigor. crescimento vegetal plantas - competição

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