Disease severity and yield of pure‐line wheat cultivars and mixtures in the presence of eyespot, yellow rust, and their combination

Five winter wheat cultivars, six two‐component cultivar mixtures, and one four‐way mixture were grown in the presence of yellow rust, eyespot, both diseases, and neither disease for three seasons. On average, mixtures reduced the severity of yellow rust relative to their component pure stands by 53%. The four‐component mixture provided better yellow rust control than did the two‐way mixtures. Eyespot severity was reduced through mixing only in the absence of yellow rust and by only three of the seven mixtures (mean reduction = 13%). Yellow rust was 13% less severe in the presence of eyespot, and eyespot was 10% more severe in the presence of yellow rust. Averaged over all years, the mixtures increased yield relative to the pure stands by 6·2, 1·7, 7·1, and 1·3% in the presence of yellow rust, eyespot, both diseases, and neither disease, respectively. Two mixtures provided significant yield increases over the means of their component pure stands (7% and 9%) in the presence of eyespot even though one of them did not significantly reduce eyespot severity. Accounting for all disease treatments and years, four mixtures provided distinctly higher yield increases than the other three. In mixtures containing a resistant cultivar and a cultivar susceptible to eyespot, yield loss by the susceptible cultivar was not compensated for by increased yield of the resistant cultivar. The mixtures showed improved yield stability relative to the pure stands, with the four‐component mixture being particularly stable.