Pre-maturation cold acquisition in Trifolium subterraneum

Abstract

The influence of different levels of temperature during seed maturation on the subsequent rate of development in plants grown from that seed was studied in a range of subterranean clover cultivars.

In one study the cultivars Carnamah, Yarloop, Woogenellup and Mt. Barker were grown at 7, 11, 14 and 17°C, and the seed produced grown on at 17°. Observations were made on the rate of leaf appearance, time of flower initiation, and time and node of first flowering. The rate of development was closely related to the temperature under which the seed was produced—the lower the temperature the faster was the rate of development. This effect was greatest with the later-flowering cultivars.

In a second experiment, seed of a number of cultivars harvested commercially from a wide range of sites in southern Australia was grown on at 17°C and the rate of development observed. Time of flowering varied markedly between samples of only three cultivars. Accordingly seed of these samples were grown on for a further generation in a controlled environment. Within two of the cultivars, Mt. Barker and Bacchus Marsh, the differences in flowering observed in the previous generation persisted, which suggests that such differences were not based on environmental factors. In the cultivar Woogenellup the differences in flowering disappeared, which suggests that the original differences arose through different environmental conditions occurring during seed maturation.

Cold acquisition in the maturing embryo does not seem to be a matter of practical consequence at present in subterranean clover, but may become so with changes in the location of seed production.