Agronomy and Crop Sciences Commons^™

Response Of Soil Biochemical And Physical Properties To Long Term Prairie Cordgrass And Kura Clover Intercropping System, Vaishnavi Varikuti

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Prairie cordgrass (Spartina pectinata) (PCG) is a warm-season perennial grass that can be used as a biofuel feedstock and can be grown on marginal lands. Previous studies on intercropping of a perennial legume i.e., kura clover (Trifolium ambiguum) (KC) with PCG can improve soil biochemical properties, increase biomass production, mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions while reducing the chemical fertilizer requirement. However, there is a lack of evidence about the effects of PCG production on soil biochemical and physical properties during the cropping season and at deeper soil depths in reference to support plant growth, environmental implications and enhance the soil …

Southeast South Dakota Experiment Farm Annual Progress Report, 2022, Southeast South Dakota Research Farm

Agricultural Experiment Station and Research Farm Annual Reports

This is an annual report of the research program at the Southeast South Dakota Research Farm in cooperation with South Dakota Agricultural Experiment Station and the SDSU College of Agriculture, Food, and Environmental Sciences and has special significance for those engaged in agriculture and the agriculturally related businesses in the ten county area of Southeast South Dakota. The results shown are not necessarily complete or conclusive. Interpretations given are tentative because additional data resulting from continuation of these experiments may result in conclusions different from those based on any one year.

Characterization Of Salt And Drought Tolerance In Sunflower (Helianthus Annuus L.), Sevgi Saylak

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Consequent to the increasing world population, food sources are needed to be increased to meet the nutritional needs. However, due to natural processes and agricultural activities, the most destructive environmental factors that limit crop production, soil salinity, and drought-exposed areas are growing. As one of the major oilseed crops, sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.), is considered to be moderately tolerant to salt and drought. Although it can grow in arid to semi-arid regions, increasing salinity and drought might adversely affect sunflower production. This study aimed to investigate several sunflower germplasms' morphological responses to salt and drought stresses. For this purpose, …

Biochar: Properties And Potential Benefits For Agricultural Soil In Rwanda, Andromede Uwase

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Physical and chemical soil degradation is becoming a major challenge for agricultural productivity in Rwanda, which is the most important part of the country’s economy. The wide spreading soil degradation in Rwanda is mainly a result of naturally poor soils coupled with unsustainable soil management leading to, for example, accelerated soil erosion, acidification, nutrient loss, compaction, and to decreasing yields. Biochar, as an end product of pyrolysis of biomass in the absence of oxygen, has been proposed as a soil amendment in remediation strategies because of its positive effects on soil productivity relevant parameters such as soil pH, structure, nutrient …

Field Validation Of A Farmer Supplied Data Approach To Close Soybean Yield Gaps In The Us North Central Region, José F. Andrade, Spyridon Mourtzinis, Juan I. Rattalino Edreira, Shawn P. Conley, John Gaska, Herman J. Kandel, Laura E. Lindsey, Seth Naeve, Scott Nelson, Maninder P. Singhi, Laura J. Thompson, James E. Specht, Patricio Grassini

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

CONTEXT: Producer-reported data can be used to identify suites of management practices that lead to higher yield and profit. However, a rigorous validation of the approach in relation to its potential impact on farmer yield and profit is lacking.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to validate a producer-data approach on its capability to guide on-farm evaluation of management practices with greatest potential for increasing producer yield and profit. We show proof of concept using soybean in the North Central US region as a case study.

METHODS: We used a combination of regression tree analysis and a spatial framework to determine practices …

A New Perspective When Examining Maize Fertilizer Nitrogen Use Efficiency, Incrementally, Newell R. Kitchen, Curtis J. Ransom, James S. Schepers, Jerry L. Hatfield, Raymond Massey, Scott T. Drummond

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

For maize (Zea mays L.), nitrogen (N) fertilizer use is often summarized from field to global scales using average N use efficiency (NUE). But expressing NUE as averages is misleading because grain increase to added N diminishes near optimal yield. Thus, environmental risks increase as economic benefits decrease. Here, we use empirical datasets obtained in North America of maize grain yield response to N fertilizer (n = 189) to create and interpret incremental NUE (iNUE), or the change in NUE with change in N fertilization. We show for those last units of N applied to reach economic optimal N …

Inactivation Of The Entire Arabidopsis Group Ii Gh3s Confers Tolerance To Salinity And Water Deficit, Rubén Casanova-Sáez, Eduardo Mateo-Bonmatí, Jan Šimura, Aleš Pěnčík, Ondřej Novák, Paul Staswick, Karin Ljung

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) controls a plethora of developmental processes. Thus, regulation of its concentration is of great relevance for plant performance. Cellular IAA concentration depends on its transport, biosynthesis and the various pathways for IAA inactivation, including oxidation and conjugation.

Group II members of the GRETCHEN HAGEN 3 (GH3) gene family code for acyl acid amido synthetases catalysing the conjugation of IAA to amino acids. However, the high degree of functional redundancy among them has hampered thorough analysis of their roles in plant development.

In this work, we generated an Arabidopsis gh3.1,2,3,4,5,6,9,17 (gh3oct) mutant to knock out the group II …

Root Exudates Impact Plant Performance Under Abiotic Stress, Yen Ning Chai, Daniel P. Schachtman

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Plant root exudates serve pivotal roles in supporting plant development and interactions with the physicochemical and biological factors in the rhizosphere. Under stress conditions, root exudation is involved in enhancing plant resource-use efficiency and facilitating the crosstalk between plant and soil microbes to ameliorate stress. Although there are a large number of root exudates that remain to be characterized, recent technological advancements have allowed for the function of many exudate compounds to be elucidated. In this review, we discuss current knowledge about the key root exudates that modulate plant resource-use efficiency under various abiotic stresses including drought, aluminum toxicity, phosphorus, …

Getting To The Root Cause: The Genetic Underpinnings Of Root System Architecture And Rhizodeposition In Sorghum, Farren Smith

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Plants are some of the most diverse organisms on earth, consisting of more than 350,000 different species. To understand the underlying processes that contributed to plant diversification, it is fundamental to identify the genetic and genomic components that facilitated various adaptations over evolutionary history. Most studies to date have focused on the underlying controls of above-ground traits such as grain and vegetation; however, little is known about the “hidden half” of plants. Root systems comprise half of the total plant structure and provide vital functions such as anchorage, resource acquisition, and storage of energy reserves. The execution of these key …

Industrial Hemp As A Resource For Birds In Agroecosystems: Human–Wildlife Conflict Or Conservation Opportunity?, Emily A. Kotten, Iona Hennessy, Bryan M. Kluever, Zachary T. Brym, Bradley F. Blackwell, Lee A. Humberg, Page E. Klug

Human–Wildlife Interactions

Industrial hemp (Cannabis sativa L.; hemp) is an emerging crop in the United States with little known about bird use or the potential for birds to become an agricultural pest. We identified birds associated with hemp fields, using repeated visits to oilseed plots in North Dakota, USA (n = 6) and cannabinoid (CBD) plots in Florida, USA (n = 4) from August to November 2020. We did not control for plot area or density; our observations were descriptive only. We observed 10 species in hemp, 12 species flying over hemp, and 11 species both foraging in and …

Ecological Intensification With Soil Health Practices Demonstrates Positive Impacts On Multiple Soil Properties: A Large-Scale Farmer-Led Experiment, Fernanda Souza Krupek, Daren D. Redfearn, Kent M. Eskridge, Andrea Basche

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Improving soil health is critical to reversing trends of soil degradation and is of increasing interest to a range of stakeholders including policymakers, agricultural industry leaders, food companies, and farmers. Crop and soil management practices focused on ecological functions can be effective in restoring fundamental biological, chemical and physical soil properties. The call for ecological intensification of agricultural systems has the potential to improve soil health and input-use efficiency. In this study, we developed a framework to classify spatial and temporal ecological intensification with soil health practices: tillage, crop rotation, cover crop, organic amendment, and crop-livestock integration. We applied this …

Phosphorus Use And Management Based On Fertilizer Placement, Rate Of Application, And Soil Biota In No-Till Situations, Brennan Alexander Bingham Lewis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Phosphorus (P) pollution has become a concern among multiple scientific organizations as it leads to eutrophication, an algal bloom that depletes lacustrine and marine ecosystems of native species. Multiple strategies can be implemented to reduce phosphorus loss from agriculture fields, which is often implicated as a cause of eutrophication. Soil phosphorus chemistry results in phosphate fertilizers absorbing to clay minerals over time. Soil phosphorus is lost from agricultural fields primarily through wind and water erosion. No-till practices prevent soil erosion, which reduces the phosphorus from loading into waterways. Fertilizer placement affects phosphorus loss. Surface application of phosphorus fertilizers increases the …

Footprints On The Prairie: Examining The Interlocking Land Histories Of The Liberty Prairie Reserve, Illinois, Anna M. Burns

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis begins with the local history of the Liberty Prairie, the land where I conducted the ecological field-work that I later discuss in my second thesis on soil microbiome diversity (“Examining Soil Microbial Diversity in Transition Zones Between Corn Fields and Restored Prairie in the Upper Midwest"). I examine the Indigenous histories of the land, and the conflicts between the Bodwéwadmi and Euro-American settlers that resulted in the land being farmed for cattle, corn, and soy for over a hundred and fifty years. I then take a step back and analyze the broader historical contexts of Midwestern Corn Belt …

Remote Sensing For Quantifying C3 And C4 Grass Ratios In Pastures, Jordyn Alyssa Bush

Theses and Dissertations--Plant and Soil Sciences

The following studies investigate the accuracy and practicality of exploiting the color dichotomy present between C₃ and C₄ grass species to estimate their respective proportions from drone or camera captured imagery. Understanding the proportions of C₃ and C₄ grasses in pastures is vital to sound decision making for livestock production. The ability to monitor these proportions remotely will also allow for large scale monitoring as well as detection of changes in botanical composition over time and in response to weather events, management, or climate change. A free green canopy cover (GCC) analyzing software, Canopeo, was used …

First Plant Cell Atlas Symposium Report, Selena L. Rice, Elena Lazarus, Christopher Anderton, Kenneth Birnbaum, Jenniofer Brophy, Benjamin Cole, Diane Dickel, David Ehrhardt, Noah Fahlgren, Margaret Frank, Elizabeth Haswell, Shao-Shan Carol Huang, Samuel Leiboff, Marc Libault, Marisa S. Otegui, Nicholas Provart, R. Glen Uhrig, Seung Y. Rhee, The Plant Cell Atlas Consortium

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

The Plant Cell Atlas (PCA) community hosted a virtual symposium on December 9 and 10, 2021 on single cell and spatial omics technologies. The conference gathered almost 500 academic, industry, and government leaders to identify the needs and directions of the PCA community and to explore how establishing a data synthesis center would address these needs and accelerate progress. This report details the presentations and discussions focused on the possibility of a data synthesis center for a PCA and the expected impacts of such a center on advancing science and technology globally. Community discussions focused on topics such as data …

A Non-Destructive Approach For Measuring Rice Panicle-Level Photosynthetic Responses Using 3d-Image Reconstruction, Jaspinder Singh Dharni, Balpreet Kaur Dhatt, Puneet Paul, Tian Gao, Tala Awada, Paul Staswick, Jason Hupp, Hongfeng Yu, Harkamal Walia

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Our understanding of the physiological response of rice inflorescence (panicle) to environmental stresses is limited by the challenge of accurately determining panicle photosynthetic parameters and their impact on grain yield. This is primarily due to lack of a suitable gas exchange methodology for panicles, as well as non-destructive methods to accurately determine panicle surface area. To address these challenges, we have developed a custom panicle gas exchange cylinder compatible with the LiCor 6800 Infra-red Gas Analyzer. Accurate surface area measurements were determined with a 3D panicle imaging platform to normalize the panicle-level photosynthetic measurements. We observed differential responses in both …

Identification Of Beneficial And Detrimental Bacteria Impacting Sorghum Responses To Drought Using Multi-Scale And Multisystem Microbiome Comparisons, Mingsheng Qi, Jeffrey C. Berry, Kira W. Veley, Lily O'Connor, Omri M. Finkel, Isai Salas-González, Molly Kuhs, Julietta Jupe, Emily Holcomb, Tijana Glavina Del Rio, Cody Creech, Peng Liu, Susannah G. Tringe, Jeffery L. Dangl, Daniel P. Schachtman, Rebecca S. Bart

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Drought is a major abiotic stress limiting agricultural productivity. Previous field-level experiments have demonstrated that drought decreases microbiome diversity in the root and rhizosphere. How these changes ultimately affect plant health remains elusive. Toward this end, we combined reductionist, transitional and ecological approaches, applied to the staple cereal crop sorghum to identify key root-associated microbes that robustly affect drought-stressed plant phenotypes. Fifty-three Arabidopsis-associated bacteria were applied to sorghum seeds and their effect on root growth was monitored. Two Arthrobacter strains caused root growth inhibition (RGI) in Arabidopsis and sorghum. In the context of synthetic communities, Variovorax strains were able to …

Evaluation Of Uav-Derived Multimodal Remote Sensing Data For Biomass Prediction And Drought Tolerance Assessment In Bioenergy Sorghum, Jiating Li, Daniel P. Schachtman, Cody F. Creech, Lin Wang, Yufeng Ge, Yeyin Shi

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Screening for drought tolerance is critical to ensure high biomass production of bioenergy sorghum in arid or semi-arid environments. The bottleneck in drought tolerance selection is the challenge of accurately predicting biomass for a large number of genotypes. Although biomass prediction by low-altitude remote sensing has been widely investigated on various crops, the performance of the predictions are not consistent, especially when applied in a breeding context with hundreds of genotypes. In some cases, biomass prediction of a large group of genotypes benefited from multimodal remote sensing data; while in other cases, the benefits were not obvious. In this study, …

Gaia Contributions To Agroecology By James Lovelock (1919-2022), Steve Gliessman, Charles A. Francis

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

In writing about the history of agroecology we too often ignore the valuable contributions of British scientist James Lovelock who recently died on his 103rd birthday. A prolific inventor and influential theorist, Lovelock is best known for the Gaia hypothesis first proposed during his innovative work in the 1960s with the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration. He suggested that ‘the biosphere has a regulatory effect on the Earth’s environment that acts to sustain life’ as written in Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth (Lovelock 1979). Lovelock further proposed that humans have strongly impacted the planet’s capacity …

Temporal Changes In The Nutrient Content Of Cattle Dung In The Nebraska Sandhills Ecosystem, Amanda Shine, Martha Mamo, Gandura O. Abagandura, Walter Schacht, Jerry Volesky

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Dung excreted by cattle composes a significant portion of the nutrient inputs in a grazed ecosystem and can have wide-ranging effects on soil properties and vegetation. However, little research has been conducted on the nutrient dynamics of excreted dung in situ that has not been disturbed prior to field sampling. In this study, we analyzed 294 dung pats (1–24 days old) collected from a Nebraska Sandhills meadow to determine water-extractable organic carbon (WEOC), water-extractable nitrogen (WEN), water-extractable phosphorus (WEP), and percent dry matter (DM) changes over time. In addition, we investigated if sample handling - frozen storage – and the …

Predicting Munsell Color For Turfgrass Leaves, William L. Berndt, Roch E. Gaussoin

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Linking turfgrass color to hue, value, chroma (H V/C) in the Munsell Plant Tissue Color Book is a visual comparison process for specifying and communicating plant color. If subjectivity of visual comparison can be mitigated, then accuracy of color matching may be improved. Research was conducted to develop an algorithm predicting H V/C from CIE-xyY color (xyY) in digital images of leaves of four turfgrasses. First, value-chroma (V/C) arrays for Munsell hue groups 5Y, 2.5GY, 5GY, 7.5GY, 10GY, and 2.5G were converted to xyY. Next, chromaticity (xy) plots from each array were fitted with …

4-Hydroxyphenylpyruvate Dioxygenase (Hppd)-Inhibiting Herbicides: Past, Present, And Future, Amit J. Jhala, Vipan Kumar, Ramawatar Yadav, Prashant Jha, Mithila Jugulam5, Martin M. Williams Ii, Nicholas E. Hausman, Franck E. Dayan, Paul M. Burton, Richard P. Dale, Jason K. Norsworthy

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

The 4-hydroxyphenylpyruvate dioxygenase (HPPD)-inhibiting herbicides are primarily used for weed control in corn, barley, oat, rice, sorghum, sugarcane, and wheat production fields in the United States. The objectives of this review were to summarize (1) the history of HPPD-inhibitor and their use in the United States, (2) HPPD-inhibitor resistant weeds, their mechanism of resistance, and management, (3) interaction of HPPD-inhibitor with other herbicides, and (4) the future of HPPD-inhibitor-resistant crops. As of 2022, three broadleaf weeds (Palmer amaranth, waterhemp, and wild radish) have evolved resistance to the HPPD-inhibitor. The predominance of metabolic resistance to HPPD-inhibitor was found in aforementioned three …

Limited Irrigation For Managing Declining Water Resources In The Us High Plains, Bijesh Maharjan, Gary Hergert, Saurav Das

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

The US High Plains region has a semiarid climate receiving between 330 and 455 mm of rainfall annually. In the Nebraska Panhandle of the High Plains, 30-year average rainfall is 394 mm, and one-fourth of agriculture is under irrigation. In addition to concerns about water quality, there is a growing concern over water quantity for ground- and surface-water resources that producers use for irrigation. Wisely managing limited water resources for irrigation can help maintain crop productivity and profitability. Deficit irrigation research for 13 years (2005–2017) was conducted in the Nebraska Panhandle to study effects of limited irrigation on maize ( …

Monitoring Environmental Policy Process: Indicators To Evaluate Performance, Stella Namanji, Charles A. Francis, Charles Ssekyewa, Geir Hofgaard Lieblein

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

The complexity of environmental policy development was examined in relation to sustainability, holistic and systems-thinking perspectives. We studied potential application of systems principles of coordination, representation, collaboration, participation and teamwork to improve policy effectiveness at formulation, communication, implementation, and operationalisation of the environment policy in Uganda. The research unveiled the ineffectiveness of the Uganda National Environment Management Policy. We applied systems theory to develop a mechanism for monitoring effectiveness of environmental policies at national level, with the goal to identify key monitoring indicators. We used the soft systems methodology to identify occurring environmental problems causing forest loss. Results suggest that …

Charles A. Francis, Abstracts And Publications [1969--2022], December 2022, Charles A. Francis

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Contents

I. Journal articles (218), p.1

II. Book reviews (60), p. 18

III. Published abstracts (213), p. 23

IV. Books (23), p. 40

V. Chapters in books (81), p. 42

VI. Symposium or workshop proceedings (127), p. 50

VII. Symposia or extension publications edited (31), p. 62

VIII. Miscellaneous (522), p. 65

Bedstraw Eradication Program 2021/22: Annual Report To Grain Growers, Department Of Primary Industries And Regional Development, Western Australia

Agriculture reports

Three-horned bedstraw is a competitive weed that can cause considerable yield loss in crops, and its seeds contaminate fodder and grain. To stop the weed becoming established in Western Australia and impacting production, WA grain/seed/hay growers (via the Grains, Seeds and Hay Industry Funding Scheme) fund the Bedstraw Eradication Program.

Effect Of Essential Oils In The Control Of Fungal Diseases In Small Grains, Esneider Mahecha Bojaca

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Spring wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) and oats (Avena sativa L.) are important crops due to their high consumption in our daily diet worldwide. They are the main food of consumption per capita due to the high amino-acid content as well of vitamins. However, grain production is limited due to the negative impact of the diseases that cause significant yield loss. Diseases in oats, such as crown rust caused by Puccinia coronata f. sp. avenae (Pca), and in wheat such as Fusarium head blight (FHB) caused by the fungus Fusarium graminearum. Foliar diseases such as tan spot incited by the fungi …

Study Of Root System Architectural Traits Of Oat And Response To Endophyte Inoculation And Drought Stress, Krishna Ghimire

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Oat is an important cereal crop grown worldwide. Oats have the potential to contribute to human health due to their unique nutritional attributes. Developing oat cultivars with efficient root systems able to extract heterogeneously distributed soil resources can help maintain yield under drought conditions and in nutrient poor soil. Various root traits determine the soil volume that is explored by the root system for resource acquisition. Knowledge about the genetic control of oat root traits and response to biotic and abiotic environmental factors is lacking. Identifying quantitative trait loci associated with root traits and understanding the response of roots to …

Keeping What You Sow: Intellectual Property Rights For Plant Breeders And Seed Growers, Paulina B. Jenney

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Over the last 150 years, the food system in the present-day United States has undergone a transformational restructuring, from a diversified, decentralized, network of farmers and seed growers, to one in which the majority of crop production is controlled by a few industrial corporations. The consolidation of power has been under-girded by the application of intellectual property rights (IPR)—especially utility patents—to plant varieties and genetic traits, which are leveraged to exclude small-scale seed growers from accessing quality germplasm. Patents and restrictive licensing agreements recapitulate colonial structures by appropriating common and traditionally community-held resources for profit, and by creating reliance on …

Soil Hydro-Physical Properties, Computed Tomography Measured Pore Parameters, And Soil Health Indicators As Influenced By Tillage And Crop Rotation Systems, Goutham Thotakuri

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Long-term tillage and crop rotation systems are important agricultural management practices as these can have direct impact on the soil’s key properties. The objectives of this study were to (ⅰ) quantify the soil pore characteristics under long-term tillage and crop rotation using X-ray computed tomography (XCT) and to assess the relationships between XCT-measured pore parameters and soil hydro-physical properties; and (ⅱ) evaluate the impacts of long-term tillage and crop rotation on select soil health indicators. The objective (ⅰ) was carried out at Haskell Agricultural Laboratory (HAL), Concord, NE; and objective (ⅰi) was carried out at South Central Agricultural Laboratory (SCAL), …