Identification of cold tolerant safflower genotypes for winter planting in cold drylands

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Department of Agronomy, Malekan branch, Islamic Azad University, Malekan, Iran

2 Dryland Agricultural Research Institute, Agricultural Research Education and Extension (AREEO), Maragheh, Iran

Abstract

Cold tolerant safflower genotypes may be used as alternative winter crop in cold drylands of Iran. 56 selected genotypes of local safflower were tested under controlled and field conditions during winter 2013 and 2014. Genotypes were tested for their withstand remaining frozen for various freezing temperatures and different times. Survival of fully acclimated seedlings was evaluated after remaining frozen for 12 hours to 20 hours at -3°C which continuously decreased -2 in each hour up to -19°C. Survival after 12 hours at -3°C ranged from 0 to 100% and after 20 hours ranged from 0 to 20%. Selected materials were irrigated and germinated during fall planting in order to expose for winter cold in the field trial. There was a large variability among accessions for freezing tolerance in both controled and field conditions. Lethal temperature for 50% of the plants (LT50) with temperatures ranging from –3 to –19°C. All selected genotypes were fully germinated in the autumn however, the percent of green stand during spring and after winter damage was observed between 1 to 90 percent. There was a negative correlastion between LT50 and percent of stands in the spring. 15 cold tolerant genotypes were selected for further investigations.

Keywords

Iranian Dryland Agronomy Journal
Volume 4, Issue 1 - Serial Number 7
September 2015
Pages 83-90

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