Influence of crop architecture on yield of winter oilseed rape

Objective

Development of an improved farming system for oilseed rape, which allows a sustained increase in grain yields and the production of energy.

Detailed objectives:

Increase the share of the generative parts of plants of the total biomass
Increase in grain and energy yield

The investigations focus is on the crop architecture of winter rape. The aim of this study is to analyze the relationship between the architecture of a rape crop and the yield of oilseed rape and thereby to consider the role of seed rate and fungicides.

Methodological procedure

In autumn 2010/2011, for three successive seasons, a three factorial field trial with two winter oilseed rape hybrid culitvars, two seed rates (30 seeds/m² and 60 seeds/m²) and 8 different fungicide treatments (triazoles) was started. The experiment is designed as a partially randomized split-split-plot with 32 members in four replications.

Overall, data on 37 parameters are collected. In addition to the assessing of the seed yield, the oil content, the harvest index and the related yield factors (plants/m², pods/plant, seeds/pod and TSW) the following parameters are also closely studied: the ground cover of the crop, the number of side branches/plant, the thickness of the flower/pod layer, the photosynthetic active radiation (PAR) in the crop, the NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) of the crop and the presence of lodging. These parameters are used to describe the development of the crop buildup of winter oilseed rape and to explain relationships in more detail. Furthermore, the disease symptoms of blackleg induced by Phoma lingam and white mould induced by Sclerotinia sclerotiorum are assessed.

Investigator: Christian Comberg, PhD

Supervisor: Prof. Andreas von Tiedemann