Agronomy and Crop Sciences Commons^™

Earthworm Density Differences Among Tallgrass Prairies Over Time In The Ozark Highlands, Carlee Hensley, Kristofor R. Brye, Mary C. Savin, Edward E. Gbur, Lisa S. Wood

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

To mitigate the loss of tallgrass prairies through fragmentation and conversion to other land uses, prairie restoration efforts have been undertaken to reclaim areas that have been previously used for agricultural production. Earthworms are a key component of the soil ecology of natural, undisturbed ecosystems. However, limited research exists on earthworm populations in prairie restorations and how earthworm densities may change over time. The objectives of this study were (a) to evaluate earthworm densities in the upper 20 cm of soil over time (i.e., May 2007 and May 2019) in a native prairie and chronosequence of three prairie restorations (i.e., …

Characterizing Expansiveness And Iron Reducibility Of Red-Clay Soils For The Purpose Of On-Site Wastewater System Placement In Arkansas, Bailey Darnell, Kristofor R. Brye, Larry T. West, Lisa S. Wood, David M. Miller

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

The lack of iron-reducing capability in some red soils poses an issue for determining the suitability for on-site wastewater treatment systems (OSWWTS). The Arkansas Department of Health allows for placement of OSWWTS in certain red-clay soils that have the potential for iron reduction and do not show expansiveness upon wetting, but only in the Ozark Highlands (Major Land Resource Area [MLRA] 116A), which is referred to as the red-soil exception. The objectives of this study were (a) to confirm the nonexpansiveness and iron reducibility of select soils in the Ozark Highlands that meet the criteria for the red-soil exception, and …

Evaluation Of Corn Herbicide Programs With And Without Atrazine, Jason K. Norsworthy, Jacob Thomas Richburg, L. Tom Barber, Trenton Roberts, Edward Gbur

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Atrazine is a foundational herbicide in corn (Zea mays L.) because of its broad-spectrum weed control and utility for pre-emergence or postemergence applications. Extensive atrazine use has led to traces in groundwater, surface water, and aquifers. This research explored corn herbicide regimes with little or no atrazine. Pre-emergence herbicide treatments [S-metolachlor (0.955 lb acre^–1); saflufenacil (0.054 oz acre^–1) plus dimethenamid-P (0.473 lb acre^–1)] and postemergence herbicide mixtures [bicyclopyrone (0.040 lb acre^–1) plus mesotrione (0.161 lb acre^–1) plus S-metolachlor (1.429 lb acre^–1); thiencarbazone-methyl (0.013 lb …

Wastewater-Recovered Struvite Effects On Total Extractable Phosphorus Compared With Other Phosphorus Sources, Ryder Anderson, Kristofor R. Brye, Lauren Greenlee, Trenton L. Roberts, Edward Gbur

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Intentional precipitation of the phosphorus (P)-containing mineral struvite (MgNH₄PO₄ · 6H₂O) is an attractive option in sustainable water management due to the ability to recover P from various waste sources. Limited research has assessed struvite's potential as a fertilizer P source in agronomic soils compared with other conventional fertilizer P sources under flooded soil conditions, common for lowland rice (Oryza sativa L.). The objective of this study was to evaluate total extractable soil P over time from a wastewater-recovered struvite (ST) material in a plant-less soil incubation with two silt-loam (SiL) and a silty …

Molecular And Physiological Responses Of Rice And Weedy Rice To Heat And Drought Stress, Leonard Bonilha Piveta, Nilda Roma-Burgos, Jose Alberto Noldin, Vivian Ebeling Viana, Claudia De Oliveira, Fabiane Pinto Lamego, Luis Antonio De Avila

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Rice is the staple food for about half of the world population. Rice grain yield and quality are affected by climatic changes. Arguably, rice cultivars’ genetic diversity is diminished from decades of breeding using narrow germplasm, requiring introgressions from other Oryza species, weedy or wild. Weedy rice has high genetic diversity, which is an essential resource for rice crop improvement. Here, we analyzed the phenotypic, physiological, and molecular profiles of two rice cultivars (IRGA 424 and SCS119 Rubi) and five weedy rice (WR), from five different Brazilian regions, in response to heat and drought stress. Drought and heat stress affected …

Effect Of Planting Date And Cultivar Maturity In Edamame Quality And Harvest Window, David Octor Moseley, Marcos Da Silva, Leandro Mozzoni, Moldir Orazaly, Liliana Florez-Palacios, Andrea Acuna, Chengjun Wu, Pengyin Chen

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Edamame is a food-grade soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] that is harvested immature between the R6 and R7 reproductive stages. To be labeled as a premium product, the edamame market demands large pod size and intense green color. A staggered harvest season is critical for the commercial industry to post-harvest process the crop in a timely manner. Currently, there is little information to assist in predicting the optimum time to harvest edamame when the pods are at their collective largest size and greenest color. The objectives of this study were to assess the impact of cultivar, planting date, and …

Seed-Shattering Phenology At Soybean Harvest Of Economically Important Weeds In Multiple Regions Of The United States. Part 2: Grass Species, Lauren M. Schwartz-Lazaro, Lovreet S. Shergill, Jeffrey A. Evans, Muthukumar V. Bagavathiannan, Shawn C. Beam, Mandy Bish, Jason A. Bond, Kevin W. Bradley, William C. Curran, Adam S. Davis, Wesley J. Everman, Michael L. Flessner, Steven C. Haring, Nicholas R. Jordan, John L. Lindquist, Jason K. Norsworthy, Tameka Sanders, Larry E. Steckel, Mark J. Vangessel, Blake Young, Steven B. Mirsky

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Seed shatter is an important weediness trait on which the efficacy of harvest weed seed control (HWSC) depends. The level of seed shatter in a species is likely influenced by agroecological and environmental factors. In 2016 and 2017, we assessed seed shatter of eight economically important grass weed species in soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] from crop physiological maturity to 4 wk after maturity at multiple sites spread across 11 states in the southern, northern, and mid-Atlantic United States. From soybean maturity to 4 wk after maturity, cumulative percent seed shatter was lowest in the southern U.S. regions and …

Evaluating Canola Genotypes For Growth And Yield Under Different Environmental Conditions In South Dakota, Unius Arinaitwe

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Canola (Brassica napus L) and carinata (Brassica carinata A. Braun) are potential oilseed crops for diversifying cropping systems and expanding into marginal lands impacted by saline and sodic soils in South Dakota (SD). However, genotypes that are high yielding, with high agronomic adaptability and stability over diverse environments, and salt tolerant have not been selected. One field experiment was conducted at two environments (Brookings - eastern SD and Pierre - western SD) from 2019 to 2020 to evaluate genotypes for growth and yield stability. Three greenhouse experiments were conducted to evaluate genotypes for salt tolerance in …

Auxin-Based Herbicide Program And Rhizobia Application For Weed Control And Nodulation Potential In Auxin Tolerant Soybean, Joy Amajioyi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Foliar-applied Bradyrhizobia to V4 soybean has been reported to increase yield up to 5%. However, a stand-alone product application may not be practical. Applying with other treatments such as post-emergence herbicide application may be economical but herbicide and/or additives may be deleterious to rhizobial growth. A laboratory study investigated the impact of herbicides (glyphosate and dicamba), additives (an oil to improve absorption and spreading; and AMS used to overcome hard water impacts on glyphosate), and herbicide + additives on bacterial growth. Optical density (OD) measurements at the wavelength of 650 nm assessed solution turbidity, a surrogate measure of bacterial growth. …

Studies On Genetic Characterization Of Agronomic Traits And Disease Resistance In Bread Wheat, Jyotirmoy Halder

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A steady increase in wheat yield is vital to feed the continuously rising world population. Systematic exploitation of wheat germplasm and a better understanding of the underlying genetic control could be pivotal in accelerating the genetic gain for yield and disease management. Various modern techniques such as genome-wide association study (GWAS), genomic selection (GS), fine mapping, and cloning can expedite wheat improvement and broaden our understanding of the complex wheat genome. In the first objective of this study, we evaluated the Watkins core set of 121 landrace cultivars (LCs) to identify novel sources of resistance against the tan spot, Stagonospora …

Arkansas Corn And Grain Sorghum Performance Tests 2020, J. F. Carlin, R. D. Bond, R. B. Morgan

Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station Research Series

Corn and grain sorghum performance tests are conducted each year in Arkansas by the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. The tests provide information to companies marketing seed within the state and aid the Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service in formulating recommendations for producers.

The 2020 corn performance tests contained 85 hybrids and were conducted at the Northeast Research and Extension Center (NEREC) at Keiser, the Lon Mann Cotton Research Station (LMCRS) near Marianna, the Bell Farming Company (BFC) near Des Arc, the Pine Tree Research Station (PTRS) near Colt, the Rohwer Research Station (RRS) near Rohwer, and the Rice …

Arkansas Soybean Performance Tests 2020, J. F. Carlin, R. D. Bond, R. B. Morgan

Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station Research Series

Soybean variety and strain performance tests are conducted each year in Arkansas by the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture’s Arkansas Crop Variety Improvement Program. The tests provide information to companies developing varieties and/or marketing seed within the State, and aid the Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service in formulating variety recommendations for soybean producers.

Continuous In Situ Soil Nitrate Sensors: The Importance Of High-Resolution Measurements Across Time And A Comparison With Salt Extraction-Based Methods, Yunjiao Zhu, Yuncong Chen, Md. Azahar Ali, Liang Dong, Xinran Wang, Sotirios V. Archontoulis, James Schnable, Michael J. Castellano

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Soil NO₃^– affects microbial processes, plant productivity, and environmental N losses. However, the ability to measure soil NO₃^– is limited by labor-intensive sampling and laboratory analyses. Hence, temporal variation in soil solution NO₃^– concentration is poorly understood. We evaluated a new potentiometric sensor that continuously measures soil solution NO₃^– concentration with unprecedented specificity due to a novel membrane that serves as a barrier to interfering anions. First, we compared sensor and salt extraction-based measurements of soil NO₃^– in well-controlled laboratory conditions. Second, using 60 d of in situ soil NO …

Abrasive Weeding As A Vehicle For Precision Fertilizer Management In Organic Vegetable Production, Tran Kim Ngan Luong, Frank Forcella, Sharon Clay, Michael S. Douglass, Samuel E. Wortman

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Abrasive weeding is a nonchemical weed control tactic that uses small, gritty materials propelled with compressed air to destroy weed seedlings. Organic fertilizers have been used successfully as abrasive grits to control weeds, but the goal for this study was to explore the effects of fertilizer grit, application rates, and background soil fertility on weeds, plant available nitrogen (N) uptake, and crop yield. Field trials were conducted in organic ‘Carmen’ sweet red pepper (Capsicum annuum) and organic ‘Gypsy’ broccoli (Brassica oleracea var. italica) and treatments included organic fertilizer grit (8N–0.9P–3.3K vs. 3N–3.1P–3.3K), grit application rates (low …

Development Of Mping-Based Activation Tags For Crop Insertional Mutagenesis, Alexander Johnson, Edward Mcassey, Stephanie Diaz, Jacod Reagin, Priscilla S. Redd, Daymond R. Parrilla, Hanh Nguyen, Adrian Stec, Lauren A.L. Mcdaniel, Thomas E. Clemente, Robert M. Stupar, Wayne A. Parrott, C. Nathan Hancock

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Modern plant breeding increasingly relies on genomic information to guide crop im- provement. Although some genes are characterized, additional tools are needed to effectively identify and characterize genes associated with crop traits. To address this need, the mPing element from rice was modified to serve as an activation tag to in- duce expression of nearby genes. Embedding promoter sequences in mPing resulted in a decrease in overall transposition rate; however, this effect was negated by using a hyperactive version of mPing called mmPing20. Transgenic soybean events carrying mPing-based activation tags and the appropriate transposase expression cassettes showed evidence of transposition. …

The Role Of Peer Irrigators On The Choice And Intensity Of Use Of Irrigation Techniques, Noah Hayward, Kent Kovacs

Discovery, The Student Journal of Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences

The use and the proportion of farmland that uses prominent irrigation practices in Arkansas were evaluated. A bivariate sample selection model evaluated the determinants of the share of irrigated land in a farm that uses each practice. In addition, the relationship between the irrigation practices a peer uses and the use and intensity of five common irrigation practices was evaluated. If a peer of an Arkansas farmer used center pivot irrigation, this increased the probability that the farmer used center pivot irrigation by 66 percentage points. A peer that used pivot irrigation decreased the proportion of irrigated land that used …

Identification And Utilization Of Genetic Determinants Of Trait Measurement Errors In Image-Based, High-Throughput Phenotyping, Yan Zhou, Aaron Kusmec, Seyed Vahid Mirnezami, Lakshmi Attigala, Srikant Srinivasan, Talukder Zaki Jubery, James Schnable, Maria G. Salas Fernandez, Baskar Ganapathysubramanian, Patrick S. Schnable

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

The accuracy of trait measurements greatly affects the quality of genetic analyses. During automated phenotyping, trait measurement errors, i.e., differences between automatically extracted trait values and ground truth, are often treated as random effects that can be controlled by increasing population sizes and/or replication number. By contrast, there is some evidence that trait measurement errors may be partially under genetic control. Consistent with this hypothesis, we observed substantial non-random, genetic contributions to trait measurement errors for five maize (Zea mays) tassel traits collected using an image-based phenotyping platform. The phenotyping accuracy varied according to whether a tassel exhibited …

Evaluation Of Corn Agronomic Management Practices Following A Rye Cover Crop, Daniel John Quinn

Theses and Dissertations--Plant and Soil Sciences

Fall implementation of a rye (Secale cereale L.) cover crop (RCC) prior to spring corn (Zea mays L.) planting is a management practice used to improve soil conservation, water quality, and limit herbicide dependence. However, corn growth and yield following a RCC is often reduced due to early-season nitrogen (N) stress and decreased plant emergence, which can limit RCC adoption. The objective(s) of this research were to evaluate corn agronomic management practices (e.g., N and seeding rate management, in-furrow (IF) starter use) following a RCC and determine which management practices can be used to limit corn stress following …

Incorporation Of Summer Annual Mixtures Into Grazing Systems In Kentucky, Kelly Marie Mercier

Theses and Dissertations--Plant and Soil Sciences

Utilizing summer annual grass-legume forage mixtures has the potential to improve forage yield and nutritive characteristics, and/or animal performance during times when cool-season pasture growth is limited by high temperatures. Legumes can utilize atmospheric nitrogen, which can increase crude protein and forage digestibility in mixtures. As nitrogen application generally improves both the yield and nutritive characteristics of summer annual forages, but can have a negative effect on legume competitiveness, nitrogen fertilizer recommendations for legume-containing summer annual mixtures are not well established.

Two experiments were conducted to determine the feasibility of utilizing summer annual mixtures in Kentucky, USA. The first experiment …

Enhancing Agroecosystem Phosphorus Management: Root Phenotyping And Decomposition For Improved Phosphorus Cycling, Rebecca Kay Mcgrail

Theses and Dissertations--Plant and Soil Sciences

Plant roots are often overlooked when making nutrient management decisions. Evaluating differences in P acquisition strategies and cycling resulting from years of shoot-specific plant breeding will aid in reducing fertilizer inputs, with the ultimate goal of improving economic sustainability of crop production and preservation of ecosystem services. To achieve this goal, this research screened a diverse panel of winter wheat cultivars that included old and modern, dwarfed and wild type varieties for physical and chemical root phenotypes related to P acquisition. Old cultivars had larger root systems with more roots that grew two times faster than intermediate/modern cultivars. Wild type …

Skeleton Weed Program 2020/21: Annual Report To Grain Growers, Department Of Primary Industries And Regional Development, Western Australia

Agriculture reports

No abstract provided.

Earthworm Differences Among Mound Positions In Native Prairies In The Ozark Highlands, Carlee D. Hensley, Kristofor R. Brye, Mary C. Savin, Lisa S. Wood, Edward E. Gbur

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Mounded, tallgrass prairie ecosystems are a unique, endangered ecosystem due to severe disturbance for agricultural production and/or urban expansion. Limited research exists on earthworm (Lumbricus terrestris) dynamics in mounded, tallgrass prairies, particularly in the Ozark Highlands region of northwestern Arkansas. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the effects of soil moisture regime (SMR), landscape position (LP), and sample date on earthworm densities in the top 20 cm of soil in two mounded, native prairies in the Ozark Highlands region of northwestern Arkansas. Juvenile and total earthworm densities were five times greater (P < .05) in the udic- and aquic-inter-mound combinations than any other SMR-LP combination in October 2018 and May 2019, respectively. Adult earthworm densities were two times greater (P < .05) in the aquic-inter-mound at Searles Prairie than any other SMR-LP combination in either mounded prairie. Juvenile earthworm densities were three times greater (P < .05) in May 2019 than in May 2018 at Chesney Prairie, but adult and total earthworm density did not change over the same period of time. Combined across all data, juvenile and total earthworm densities were positively correlated (P …