Yield and Seed Quality Changes According to Delayed Harvest with Rainfall Treatment in Soybean (Glycine max L.)

Recently in Korea, soybean harvesting has been delayed due to rainfall during the harvesting season, resulting in a reduction in yield and seed quality. This study was conducted to analyze the changes in yield and seed quality during delayed harvest with rainfall treatment using different harvesting methods, including field harvesting and polyethylene film covering after cutting fully-matured soybean plants (PE covering after cutting), with two major Korean soybean cultivars (Glycine max L), Pungsannamulkong and Daewonkong. The shattering rate of Pungsannamulkong, which is higher than that of Daewonkong, increased up to 41.8% when the harvest was delayed for 40 days without rainfall treatment by harvesting with PE covering after cutting. The weight of 100 seeds tended to decrease slightly as harvesting was delayed. When Daewonkong was harvested using the PE covering after cutting method with rainfall treatment, the yield decreased to the lowest level with a 0.8 kg ha-1 daily reduction rate. Pungsannamulkong showed the lowest yield when harvested using PE covering after cutting without rainfall treatment with a 3.4 kg ha daily reduction rate. The infected seed rate increased according to the harvest delay in both cultivars, and significant differences were observed according to rainfall treatment and harvesting method. The germination rate was maintained above 95% even after 40 days of delayed harvest if there was no rainfall treatment. However, with rainfall treatment, the germination rate was significantly lowered as harvesting time was delayed. In the field harvesting with rainfall treatment, the germination rate decreased to 77.2% for Daewonkong and 76.5% for Pungsannamulkong after 40 days of harvest delay. For the 100-seed weight, effects of individual treatments and interactions between treatments were not observed. In contrast, the effect of interactions between treatments on the shattering rate was significant in both cultivars, indicating that the shattering rate had the greatest impact on the yield changes during delayed harvest.