Reducing terminal heat barrier in wheat production

Abstract

Wheat is the second most important crop after rice in India and occupies 29.56 m ha area. Heat stress is one of the major abiotic stress that reduce wheat quality and quantity. In India the lower productivity of wheat is due to shorter crop duration and period of grain filling, and higher temperatures during crop growth particularly during grain filling. Late planting of wheat in India is common due to the intensive cropping system, and often delays the sowing of the crop up to the middle of January, particularly in North West India where it is generally sown after harvest of paddy, sugarcane, pigeonpea, cotton and potato. Higher temperatures affect all phases of crop growth, accelerate floral initiation, reduce the period of spike development, resulting in shorter spike with lower number of spikelets and adversely affecting pollen development. High temperatures are known to have deleterious affects on photosynthesis, respiration and reproduction.