Breeding of grain sorghum in the Rostov region

Grain sorghum is the most essential fodder and food crop with a range of advantages. The purpose of the study is to reveal the features of grain sorghum's seed-growing and to carry out the analysis of varietal composition, the amount of planted seeds according to the categories, and of the areas planted with sorghum in the Rostov region in 2012-2014. There is a low amount of areas planted with sorghum and they don’t exceed 170 000 ha in Ru ssia, with no more than 60 000 ha in the Rostov region. One of the main reasons of insufficient distribution of the crop are the difficulties in seed growing, namely a late maturation of seeds (September, October), which impedes harvesting and reduces the quality of sowing characteristics. In the Rostov region it’s possible to obtain high quality seeds if apply high agricultural technology, compl y with the rules of seed-growing and choose proper varietal composition. A significant part of the varieties and the hybrids of grain sorghum (48.9%) included in the State Register of breeding achievements has been recommended for cultivation in the North-Caucasus region. The varieties of FSBSI All-Russian Research Institute of Grain Crops named after I.G Kalinenko occupy the largest part (51.3-73.3%) of all the areas planted with sorghum in the Rostov region. According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food of the Rostov region there is an increase of the amount of sown grain sorghum seeds of different categories from 2 950 hwt in 2012 to 11 100 hwt in 2014. It leads to significant increasing of areas planted with sorghum in the Rostov region from 14 500 to 58 300 hectares

Minimization of tillage for row crops and their productivity

The experiments were carried out in the southern part of the Rostov region in 2007-2015 on usual heavy loam chernozem. Three methods were used: moulded ploughing on 20-25 cm with plow PN-5-35; unmoulded ploughing on 20-25 cm with unit KAO-2; surface ploughing on 8-12 cm with disker AG-2.4. It was revealed that a long-term surface tillage resulted in the increase of soil density. At the beginning of the crop rotation the soil density was 1.21 g/cm3 in the layer of 10-20 cm and 20-30 cm after surface tillage, but it was 1.07 and 1.14 g/cm3 respectively after plowing. To the end of the crop rotation the soil density was 1.11-1.09 g/cm3 after deep tillage and 1.31-1.32 g/cm3 in the layer of 10-20 cm and 20-30 cm after surface tillage. Height of sunflower plants was 1.35 m and diameter of a sunflower head was 128 mm after surface tillage; sunflower plant height was 1.39 m and diameter of a sunflower head was 149 mm after deep tillage (moldboard plowing). Height of maize plants was 2.15 m after moldboard plowing and 2.00 m after surface tillage. The productivity of sunflower was 1.64 t/ha after surface tillage and 1.88 t/ha after moldboard plowing. The productivity of maize after moldboard plowing was 5.35 t/ha on average in 2014-2015 and was only 4.06 after surface tillage that was on 1.29 t/ha less. The maximum average profitability of sunflower production was 148.9% after moldboard plowing that surpasses this index on 32.8% at a long-term surface tillage. The profitability of maize production was 175.1% after moldboard plowing and only 117.3% after surface tillage

SEARCH FOR THE CORRELATION BETWEEN ALLELIC POLYMORPHISM OF THE PPD AND VRN GENES WITH THE VARIABILITY OF THE MAIN ECONOMICALLY VALUABLE TRAITS OF WINTER BARLEY

Winter barley is an important agricultural crop whose grain is used for fodder and food purposes. The main advantage of winter barley over spring barley is in an earlier ripening period, the ability to use winter and early spring moisture reserves, due to which winter barley produces a yield in 1.5–2 times higher than spring barley. Because of increasing climate aridity in the south of the country, the development of early ripening winter barley varieties, as well as varieties with an alternative type of development (facultative wheat) is of great importance. The length of the growing period (especially ‘sprouts-earing’ phase) and responsiveness to barley vernalization is controlled by the Ppd and Vrn genetic systems. It is known that the Ppd and Vrn genes have a pleiotropic effect, that is, they affect many traits, including the general adaptability and seed productivity of plants. Therefore, among the analyzed traits, the dependence of which on the allelic diversity of the genes is required to be established, there should be present not only the starting time of earing and responsiveness to vernalization, but also other economically valuable traits (productivity parameters, lodging degree, etc.). The purpose of the study was to establish the influence of allelic polymorphism of the studied genes on the variability of the main economically valuable traits. The object of the research was 94 varieties of local (Zernograd, Rostov region, Russia) and other district breeding. It has been identified that the research tests were successful for only one of the five tested marker systems. It was the marker system for the Vrn-H2 gene, which determines the type of barley development (winter, spring, facultative). The polymorphism of the Vrn-H2 gene significantly influences on the protein percentage in the kernels and on the resistance of varieties to lodging