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Soil Water Regime Affecting Correlation of Carbon Isotope Discrimination with Yield and Water‐Use Efficiency of Winter Wheat
Author(s) -
Wang Yanzhe,
Zhang Xiying,
Zhang Xiaoyu,
Shao Liwei,
Chen Suying,
Liu Xiuwei
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
crop science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.76
H-Index - 147
eISSN - 1435-0653
pISSN - 0011-183X
DOI - 10.2135/cropsci2014.11.0793
Subject(s) - water use efficiency , agronomy , irrigation , water content , soil water , yield (engineering) , biology , mathematics , ecology , materials science , geotechnical engineering , metallurgy , engineering
Improving crop water‐use efficiency (WUE) is critical in securing food production under arid and semiarid regions, but a quick and accurate method for quantifying crop WUE is lacking. A field study on winter wheat ( Triticum aestivum L.) was conducted under six irrigation regimes in two growing seasons (2011–2012 and 2012–2013) to determine the sampling time and the condition of soil moisture on the relationship of C isotope discrimination (Δ 13 C; measured by flag leaves, other leaves, and kernel) with grain yield and WUE at different levels (leaf level as WUE L , biomass level as WUE b and grain‐yield level as WUE g ). The results showed that the accumulated average soil water condition affected the leaf and kernel Δ 13 C. The kernel Δ 13 C and flag leaf Δ 13 C after heading were significantly related to the final biomass and grain production ( P < 0.05), but their relationship to WUE g and WUE b was variable as a result of the effects of seasonal weather conditions on harvest index (HI) and soil evaporation. Kernel Δ 13 C or flag leaf Δ 13 C can be used to assess the yield of winter wheat but may not be able to predict the WUE g and WUE b . The WUE L was related to the soil water condition at the time when the measurements occurred. The WUE L might be a useful indicator of WUE at yield level when soil water condition at measuring of WUE L could represent the average soil water condition of the whole growing season of the crop.