Journal of the Saudi Society of Agricultural Sciences最新文献

Walnut production is expanding worldwide due to the high demand for natural products with proven nutraceutical properties. This expansion includes new growing areas, such as central–western Argentina, where crop water requirements have yet to be determined and little is known about the response in terms of production quality to the water regime. The aim of this study was to assess the effects of four irrigation regimes (at 50, 75, 100, and 125 % of crop evapotranspiration) and the weather conditions over two consecutive seasons in a young Chandler walnut orchard in terms of in–shell and kernel caliber, kernel color, oil concentration, and fatty acid profile. Quality production characteristics were not significantly affected by irrigation regimes within each season. In contrast, the quality parameters achieved were significantly different between seasons. The first season (S1) was wetter (462 mm) and cooler (17.05 °C mean air temperature in the oil accumulation period) and produced more extra–light kernels (92%). The second season (S2) was drier (326 mm) and warmer (19.02 °C) and produced a lower proportion of extra–light kernels (82.2%). In addition, during the second season, walnuts produced larger kernels with a higher oil concentration (62.7%; +3.5% of S1) and a better omega–6/omega–3 ratio (3.25 in S2 vs. 3.70 in S1). These results suggest that kernel quality was more sensitive to the seasonal temperature than the irrigation studied regimes. The nutritional quality of walnuts may increase significantly in warmer seasons/environments despite the deterioration of kernel color.

Alpaca fibers are used to create luxury garments, and simultaneous selection for optimizing fiber density and the density of hair ducts in the skin of alpacas could result in a more profitable product for breeders. The objective of this study was i) to quantify fiber density (FibDen), density of hair ducts (DenDuc), and the relationship between No. of fibers/No. of ducts (Fib/Duc) by age and sex, and ii) to estimate heritability and genetic correlation between FibDen and DenDuc. This study was conducted in the CEDAT (Centro de Desarrollo Alpaquero de Toccra) in the Department of Arequipa, Peru. A total of 1,813 alpacas of different sex and age with pedigree information were analyzed from years 2004–2018. The quantification of FibDen, DenDuc and Fib/Duc was estimated using Fiber-Den equipment in an area of 1 mm² in the middle rib region of the animal. The average FibDen, DenDuc and Fib/Duc was 24.75 ± 5.48, 7.83 ± 2.17 and 3.25 ± 0.55, respectively. The heritability for FibDen, DenDuc, and Fib/Duc was 0.48 ± 0.04, 0.53 ± 0.04, and 0.20 ± 0.03, respectively. The genetic correlation between FibDen and DenDuc was 0.87 ± 0.06. The estimated heritabilities of these traits in Peruvian alpaca population are moderate to high and indicate that these characteristics could be used as selection criteria in breeding programs.

The application of humic substances (HSs) promotes bioactive effects in plants, stimulating growth and development, promoting against biotic and abiotic stresses and increasing agricultural productivity. There are countless examples of fertilizers and biostimulants made from HSs that are capable of being used to form state-of-the-art intelligent agricultural technologies with increased efficiency due to their versatility and structural richness. In recent years, the phytotechnics associated with HS application to foliage have improved, and the applications have been expanded to all plant groups; however, the studies are disaggregated and still scarce, hindering the integration of data and the implementation of this technology for researchers, technicians, and specialists. The objective of this review was to gather all possible evidence related to the ability of HSs to stimulate plant metabolism when applied to foliage. This review first addressed the characteristics of foliar application and HSs. Subsequently, studies were organized by plant groups: vegetables, grasses, legumes, fruit, oilseeds, and medicinal and ornamental plants. Regardless of the plant group, HS foliar application stimulated parameters such as biomass and plant height and increased levels of photosynthetic pigments and agricultural productivity. Foliar application promoted protection against stress events, increasing the activity of peroxidase (POX), catalase (CAT), and phenyl alanine ammonium lyase (PAL) enzymes. Fruit quality also improved with HS foliar application, especially the total sugar content and the amount of oil, protein, and fiber, among others. Based on this review, we propose studies that integrate new forms and technologies of HS foliar application to plants. Experiments with various sources of origin, plant types, and environments are necessary to standardize the application forms of these compounds. Thus, we conclude that HSs are a viable technology that is environmentally friendly and highly accessible to small farmers and family farmers.

A growing need for irrigation in agriculture results from recent climatic parameter uncertainties brought on by climate change, global warming, and other factors. The present-day tumultuous, unpredictable, ever-changing, and ambiguous nature of the onset, cessation, and duration of adverse weather conditions poses a formidable obstacle for farmers in formulating informed judgments pertaining to agricultural practices. In this study, the metrological simulation was carried out based on different input variables, including wind speed, wind direction, relative humidity, and minimum and maximum temperature, to predict the rainfall in the arid agricultural area of Kano, Nigeria. For this purpose, an adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS), feed-forward neural network (FFNN), and multi-linear regression (MLR) were utilized. Five evaluation criteria for predictive control, including determination coefficient (R²), Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE), mean square error (MSE), mean absolute error (MAE), and root mean square error (RMSE), were used to figure out how accurate the models were based on how the features were chosen. The output proved the reliable accuracy of intelligent regression learning. The results depicted that MLR-M1 with R² = 0.9989, NSE = 0.9872, and RMSE = 0.0016 performs the best at predicting rainfall, even though all three computational models (ANFIS, FFNN, and MLR) produced good results. The predictive models justified reliable tools for the management of water resources, especially in the agricultural sector.

The agri-food production areas of global importance are the arid zones, which represent 43%. Notwithstanding this, there are factors that decrease the productivity of glycophyte crops. A global proposal is focused on generating agricultural technologies that innovate endemic agro-industrial crops (halophytes) that have a high potential for industrialization under arid and salinity conditions. The agro-industrial importance of some halophytes is on their capacity to produce fodder, vegetable oils and food for human consumption on salads and flours. In addition, its applicability has been demonstrated in industries such as cosmetology, construction, dry-pressed fiber, and above all for the recovery of areas degraded by salinization; either natural or induced by inadequate agricultural practices; which favors the rural economy. Likewise, to promote the optimal development of these novo monocultures, it is the use of vegetative stimulants of those areas, preventing the application of chemical agro-inputs in which chitosan and phenolic extracts stand out. The first, obtaining an industrial level is from crustaceans, allowing the large volumes of crustacean waste to be used in coastal areas; Its biological characteristics allow it to be elucidated as a product with a high biostimulant effect to improve the germination process in seeds, yields, the ability to adsorb plant nutrients and potentiate the defense mechanism. In relation to phenolic extracts, they are a group of important micronutrients for the human diet and are present in vegetables with different chemical structures and biological activity, and their effect has been related to a better development of plants. Based on the above, the objective of the study was to demonstrate the potential of chitosan from crustaceans and phenolic compounds from Maclura tinctoria as biostimulants in the ecophysiology of the halophyte Salicornia bigelovii. The results show that the phenological variables are promoted by chitosan and phenolic compounds, the former standing out, a ratio of 1000 ppm in all the variables analyzed, this behavior may be due to the fact that chitosan allows a better use of the water resource and better nutrient absorption, as well as the availability of Nitrogen through chitosan deficiency in the soil, which is reflected in the agronomic yields and eco-physiological variables of the plant.

Smart agro-practices over the years have revolutionized the agriculture sector and promoted the concept of sustainable agriculture. One such practice is use of agro-waste biochar in agricultural, environmental, and climatic operations. The viability of using a biochar-based nanocomposite as a support fertilizer for the gradual release of nitrogen, potassium, and phosphorus in various media is examined in this study. The banana peel biochar (BPBC) and its nanocomposite (BNF) were prepared using a simple yet comprehensive chemical process. Synthesized materials were evaluated using FT-IR and SEM/EDX. Physical attributes as well as fertilizer basic characteristics were determined and prepared nanocomposite demonstrated noticeably better water absorbance ratio (68%), equilibrium water content (78.97%), and swelling ratio (3.64 g g⁻¹) than biochar, which is advantageous for preserving soil water levels. The salt index values (0.087mmhos/cc) of the created nanocomposite performed better when compared to the conventional fertilizers due to their safer application. Long-term availability of all doped minerals to the plants, during experimental cycle, was revealed by slow-release nutrient studies in water and soil, which is ideal for promoting germination and growth. The findings of this research revealed that prepared BNF showed improved germination parameters i.e., time for 50% germination (3.4, 3.3, 4.4 days), germination index (3.1, 3.5, 2.4), final germination percentage (91.7, 100, 83.3%), mean germination time (4.0, 3.9, 4.9 days), for cucumber, broccoli and okra, respectively. In addition to that the prepared BNF facilitated enhanced shoot and root length in all the three vegetables as compared to conventional fertilizers. The dose optimization studies depicted that best results of germination as well as plant growth parameters are facilitated by BNF (37.5 kg/ha) owing to enhancement in soil quality by supplying additional organic matter in addition to provision of nutrients on slow-release.

Agriculture is a primary sector which plays an important role in the global economy. Global value added (GVA) generated by agriculture and its allied activities like fisheries and forestry contributed 3.5 trillion dollars from 2000 to 2019 and grew by 73%. Along with this, agriculture provided employment for 874 million people in 2020 which is 27% of the total global workforce according to FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation). Global production of primary crops (Wheat, rice, sugarcane and maize) commodities reached 9.5 billion tonnes in 2021 increasing by 54% since 2000. Agriculture can be practiced using a variety of methods including organic farming, intercropping, relay intercropping, permaculture, and traditional farming. In organic farming, biofertilizer usage is prioritized over chemical fertilizers utilized in conventional farming. The association between organic farming practices and product quality is going to be the primary focus of this analysis. In addition to this, many other considerations are associated with organic systems, such as the quality of the soil, the nutritional content of the produce, methods of disease and insect control, and biopesticides. Along with this, there is a comparison between organic and conventional types of farming systems in terms of yield, quantity, product quality, economic performance, and soil quality. This article presents an analysis of the current state of knowledge concerning the market worth of a variety of organic products, as well as the economics associated with organic farming, there ought to be an increase in the amount of money invested in organic agricultural systems. The quality of the many different biopesticides that are already in use could be enhanced through additional research into farming practices. The next period will undoubtedly be the one with availability and viability of variety of organic items having numerous benefits leading to healthy life.

This study aims to identify factors influencing farmers’ acceptance of the use of drone for rice cultivation in Malaysia. A total of 204 farmers who hired custom operator of drone at rice granaries in Kota Bharu Utara district, Kelantan state of Malaysia were selected as the samples in this study. Face-to-face survey technique was employed to collect data form the sampled farmers. Factor analysis was utilized to examine the scaled responses. The findings of this study have successfully identified 15 factors that have correlation with the farmers’ acceptance of the use of drone in the study area. However, 2 out of 15 factors, namely ‘drone roles’ and ‘drone handling skill’ were highly significant. A rank of these factors was also successfully established from this study. Knowing of these factors is valuable for improving management of the use of drone for rice cultivation that suit to the real-farmers’ environment in efforts of achieving economic and technical satisfactions of the field operation.

In this investigation, Blue Cherry fruit was used to isolate potential probiotic isolate and characterized for their beneficial attributes. The main objective of the study was to evaluate the antagonistic activity of the isolated bacteria against plant pathogenic bacteria such as Ralstonia solanacearum, Pectobacterium carotovorum sub sp. carotovorum and Xanthomonas oryzae pv oryzae and also to evaluate the isolate for potential probiotic, plant growth promoting and biocontrol activity. A total of nine isolates were isolated from Blue Cherry fruit and initially screened for microscopic and biochemical characters. The agar-well diffusion method, paper disc, spot inoculation and microplate method were used to test the antibacterial activity from the cultured supernatants against plant pathogenic bacteria and zone of inhibition ranged from 0.6 to 2.1 cm and per cent inhibition of plant pathogenic bacteria ranged from 64.81 to 71.70 %. Effective isolate MYSBC14 was genotyped based on 16S rDNA and identified as Enterobacter faecium OL454757. Effective isolate E. faecium MYSBC14 was further characterized for probiotic properties, PGPR and bio-control attributes. MYSBC14 survived under pH 2 and pH 4 after 2 and 4 h after incubation (38.08 and 23.16 %, 87.90 to 82.02 % respectively) and was susceptible to majority of antibiotics evaluated. A survival rate of 52.67 and 43.01 % was recorded at 0.3 % oxgall salt concentration after 2 and 4 h after incubation. The cell surface hydrophobicity of 90.24 % and auto aggregation of 8.10 to 22.02 % represented the adhesion properties of the isolate. MYSBC14 showed indole acetic acid production (11.56 µg/mL), gibberellic acid production (10.18 µg/mL) and gave positive results for solubilization of phosphate, potash, protease and siderophore production and was found negative for zinc and silicon solubilization, cellulose degradation activity, HCN production activity and amylase activity. The findings of the present investigation showed that isolated probiotic organism possesses promising antibacterial, probiotic attributes, plant growth promoting characteristics and bio-control traits.