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Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions

While intercropping is known to have positive effects on crop productivity, it is unclear whether the effects of mixing species start at the early plant stage, that is, during germination. We tested whether the germination of two legume species, alsike clover and black medic, characterized by a cont...

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Autores principales: Elsalahy, Heba, Bellingrath-Kimura, Sonoko, Kautz, Timo, Döring, Thomas
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: PeerJ Inc. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7863785/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33604168
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.10615
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author Elsalahy, Heba
Bellingrath-Kimura, Sonoko
Kautz, Timo
Döring, Thomas
author_facet Elsalahy, Heba
Bellingrath-Kimura, Sonoko
Kautz, Timo
Döring, Thomas
author_sort Elsalahy, Heba
collection PubMed
description While intercropping is known to have positive effects on crop productivity, it is unclear whether the effects of mixing species start at the early plant stage, that is, during germination. We tested whether the germination of two legume species, alsike clover and black medic, characterized by a contrasting response to water availability and temperature is affected by mixing. We set up four experiments in each of which we compared a 1:1 mixture against the two monocultures, and combined this with various other experimental factors. These additional factors were (i) varied seed densities (50%, 100% and 150% of a reference density) in two field trials in 2016 and 2017, (ii) varied seed densities (high and low) and water availability (six levels, between 25% and 100% of water holding capacity (WHC)) in a greenhouse pot trial, (iii) varied seed spacing in a climate chamber, and (iv) varied temperatures (12 °C, 20 °C and 28 °C) and water availability (four levels between 25% and 100% of WHC) in a climate chamber. Across all experiments, the absolute mixture effects (AME) on germination ranged between −9% and +11%, with a median of +1.3%. Within experiments, significant mixture effects were observed, but the direction of these effects was inconsistent. In the field, AME on germination was significantly negative at some of the tested seed densities. A positive AME was observed in the climate chamber at 12 °C, and the mean AME decreased with increasing temperature. Higher density was associated with decreased germination in the field, indicating negative interaction through competition or allelopathy, among seedlings. Our findings indicate that interaction among seeds in species mixtures may be ongoing during germination, but that the direction of the mixture effect is affected by complex interactions with abiotic and biotic factors.
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spelling pubmed-78637852021-02-17 Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions Elsalahy, Heba Bellingrath-Kimura, Sonoko Kautz, Timo Döring, Thomas PeerJ Agricultural Science While intercropping is known to have positive effects on crop productivity, it is unclear whether the effects of mixing species start at the early plant stage, that is, during germination. We tested whether the germination of two legume species, alsike clover and black medic, characterized by a contrasting response to water availability and temperature is affected by mixing. We set up four experiments in each of which we compared a 1:1 mixture against the two monocultures, and combined this with various other experimental factors. These additional factors were (i) varied seed densities (50%, 100% and 150% of a reference density) in two field trials in 2016 and 2017, (ii) varied seed densities (high and low) and water availability (six levels, between 25% and 100% of water holding capacity (WHC)) in a greenhouse pot trial, (iii) varied seed spacing in a climate chamber, and (iv) varied temperatures (12 °C, 20 °C and 28 °C) and water availability (four levels between 25% and 100% of WHC) in a climate chamber. Across all experiments, the absolute mixture effects (AME) on germination ranged between −9% and +11%, with a median of +1.3%. Within experiments, significant mixture effects were observed, but the direction of these effects was inconsistent. In the field, AME on germination was significantly negative at some of the tested seed densities. A positive AME was observed in the climate chamber at 12 °C, and the mean AME decreased with increasing temperature. Higher density was associated with decreased germination in the field, indicating negative interaction through competition or allelopathy, among seedlings. Our findings indicate that interaction among seeds in species mixtures may be ongoing during germination, but that the direction of the mixture effect is affected by complex interactions with abiotic and biotic factors. PeerJ Inc. 2021-02-02 /pmc/articles/PMC7863785/ /pubmed/33604168 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.10615 Text en © 2021 Elsalahy et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
spellingShingle Agricultural Science
Elsalahy, Heba
Bellingrath-Kimura, Sonoko
Kautz, Timo
Döring, Thomas
Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions
title Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions
title_full Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions
title_fullStr Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions
title_full_unstemmed Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions
title_short Effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions
title_sort effects of mixing two legume species at seedling stage under different environmental conditions
topic Agricultural Science
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7863785/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33604168
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.10615
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