A University of Manitoba (UofM) professor has found a relation between soybean pod height and reduced yield losses, something farmers have known about for years.
Dr. Belay Ayele, professor of the Department of Plant Science at the UofM, has been looking into soybean pod height for years, but his work on plant growth regulators (PGRs) and plant hormones started long before then.
PGRs have historically been used to reduce plant height, but Ayele started to wonder if they could be used for the opposite reason. With his goal of reducing harvest losses for soybean growers, Ayele started looking at his options, and has been working with PGRs to tackle the problem.
PGRs modify and regulate plant growth through natural or synthetic compounds. They can work at different stages of plant development and can either promote or inhibit growth. The commonly known examples are PGRs used in wheat, barley, and oats to shorten plant height and make the crops less susceptible to lodging. The use of such PGRs is more important under high nitrogen fertilizer rate, which enhances crop growth and more likely lodging.
“The problem with soybeans is the pod height,” said Ayele. “With an elongated plant, it means pods are safe and higher from the ground.”
The common issue soybean growers are running into at harvest is many plants’ pods sit lower than the lowest they can set their combine cutter bar, resulting in countless wasted pods after cutting. With higher pods comes a higher cutter bar setting and theoretically no pod loss. Reports indicate the lowest soybean pods should sit at least 12 cm high to be safely harvested.
“Through promoting the elongation of soybean plants by using a specific PGR, we found the lowest pods can be set higher from the ground, with a pod tip at about 13 cm high from the base of the plant,” said Ayele. “Lowest pods set at such height can be easily captured by the combine cutter. So far, the scope of our work is limited to a controlled environment, thus, we haven’t tested the treatment at field level. That comes next.”
Right now, Ayele applies the PGR directly on-seed a few days before planting, but when it comes time to put the seed in the ground, it’s still wet. For ease of planting the seeds at a large-scale level, Ayele is now looking for a method to treat the seeds with the PGR, and have them be dry for planting, while maintaining the advantage of the PGR treatment.
BrettYoung’s soybean varieties have been known on the marketplace for their excellent pod height, and we continue to strive for higher pod height while screening new varieties. View all of our soybean varieties here.
