Friday, April 04, 2008

And Then a Miracle Occurs...(Desperate Times Part 5)

Well! Not only has the majority of the Groundhog wheat emerged, it has jointed. This is big news because the difference between winter wheat, (which we grow in Kansas) and spring wheat, (grown farther north) is the need to vernalize. The plant has to go through X amount of cold weather for X amount of time before it will make the physiological changes necessary to produce a seed head. The only way to tell if this has happened for sure is if the wheat plant joints, or starts to push up a stalk. So a big danger in planting wheat in February is that it won't get quite enough cold weather to vernalize. Looking East

Looking west. You can also see that the wheat that was planted in October which DID sprout, pretty much sprouted at the same time as the February planted wheat. I should also point out that I took these pictures from the worst spot in the field, so most of the stand is actually better than what you can see here.

Here is an example of the wheat close up. Behind this row you can see pretty good examples of the damage blowing sand does to baby wheat plants, as well as one seed which never had a chance. That seed was planted about a little over an inch and a half deep, so you can imagine the amount of wind erosion which has taken place just since February. Hopefully the wheat will be able to hold its ground (literally) from here on out.

In this picture I have pointed out the leaf collars which indicate that the plant has jointed. I tried to take a picture of the whole plant pulled out of the ground for you to see, but they were blurry.

15 points if you can identify the source of this post title.


betsyann said...

I find this post to be quite informative and enjoyable. I especially like the arrows. If you keep blogging like this, I may know what you are talking about at lunch.

Ben said...

g. larson...i love that one, and i love all the others too

i agree with betsy, except for the lunch part

malh said...

lobiwan, your so blessed...Robert won't even allow me to speak about work over lunch, much less try to understand it.