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Seed Setting and Average Seed Weight as Affected by Two Methods of Opening Barley Flowers for Emasculation 1
Author(s) -
Bonnett O. T.
Publication year - 1938
Publication title -
agronomy journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.752
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1435-0645
pISSN - 0002-1962
DOI - 10.2134/agronj1938.00021962003000060007x
Subject(s) - citation , emasculation , mathematics , horticulture , library science , biology , agronomy , computer science , botany , pollen , pollination
E and cross-pollination of barley is a tedious and time-consuming process and any method that will bring about an increase in the percentage of seed set and an increase in the average weight a seed is of value. If, in cross-pollination, a high percentage of the flowers set seed, the number of flowers that must be crossed to obtain a given number of seeds can be reduced and thus bring about a saving in time and effort. Furthermore, crossed seed as near the same size as the naturally produced parent seed is also desirable when the growth of the F1 plants is to be compared with that of their parents. Tschermac (4) ~ has described the technic of crossing wheat, oats, rye, and barley. He opened barley flowers for emasculation and artificial cross-pollination by cutting off the upper one-third to one-half of the tips of the lemmas and paleas. Pope (2) described a rapid method for making small grain hybrids. His method was concerned with the manner of applying pollen to the emasculated barley flowers and not with the method of opening the barley flowers for emasculation. Woodworth and Bonnett (5) published a photograph showing the two methods of opening barley flowers that are more fully discussed in the present article. In the present paper a description will be given of two methods of opening barley flowers for emasculation and cross-pollination and data showing the effect of the two methods upon seed setting and seed size will also be presented. In addition, data will be given showing the effect of mutilating barley flowers in different ways upon the average seed weight.