THE YIELD AND QUALITY OF SUNFLOWER SEEDS DEPEND ON THE PRE-SOWING TREATMENT OF THE SEEDS AND EXTRA-ROOT NUTRIENTS
Authors: Rozhkov Artur , Kalinov Oleksandr 
Published: August 2024

The article presents the results of two-year studies on the effect of different options of pre-sowing treatment of seeds with various combinations of bacterial, mycorrhizal preparations and growth stimulators based on humic substances, and foliar fertilizing with various combinations of growth stimulators and complex water-soluble fertilizers on seed yield, oil content and collection from 1 hectare of crops high oil sunflower hybrid Aurora AM. The research was conducted during 2022 and 2023 on the basis of LLC “Alliance Agro” located in the Pyryatinsky district of the Poltava region. The technology of sunflower cultivation, with the exception of the investigated issues, was generally accepted for the research area. The yield results showed a significant positive effect of pre-sowing seed treatment. On average, by years and variants of foliar fertilizing, the highest yield of sunflower seeds was in the variant of pre-sowing treatment of seeds with a mixture of Micofrend, BlackJack and “PMK-U” drugs – 2.66 tons/hectare, which is by 0.3 tons/hectare (12.7 %) is higher than on the control version. The advantage of this option in terms of seed yield was noted in the weather conditions of both years. In 2022 and 2023, it was 2.37 and 2.94 tons/hectare, respectively, which is 0.27 and 0.32 tons/hectare higher than in the NIR05 control – 0.06 and 0.09 tons/hectare. In general, according to the experiment, due to the optimization of pre-sowing seed treatment and foliar fertilization, the yield of sunflower seeds on average in two years was increased by 0.45 tons/hectare or almost 20.0%, which indicates the need to pay more attention to pre-sowing seed treatment and foliar feeding. The largest collection of oil in an average of two years – 1,417 tons/hectare was obtained in the variant of pre-sowing treatment of seeds with a mixture of Micofrend, Blackjack and “PMK-U” and carrying out two foliar fertilizing with a mixture of the Blackjack growth stimulator with the formulations of the complex fertilizer Jiva MIX recommended for a specific period of plant growth. Compared to the control, the increase in the indicator was 0.271 tons/hectare or almost 24.0%. According to years of research, the highest oil collection from 1 hectare was also in this variant. In contrast to the seed yield, the oil collection in the variants of three foliar top dressings was somewhat lower than after two top dressings. This trend is associated with a decrease in the oil content in the seeds after the third foliar feeding, while the yield did not increase significantly. Pre-sowing treatment of seeds with a mixture of all drugs provided both the highest seed yield and the highest oil content in seeds, which is why its greater effect on oil collection from 1 hectare than on seed yield is associated with this. Thus, in this variant, compared to the control, the seed yield increased by 12.7% on average over the years and foliar fertilization, while the oil yield from 1 hectare increased by 16.2%. Like the seed yield, the oil yield from 1 hectare underwent greater changes under the influence of weather conditions, while their influence was somewhat less than that of the seed yield. Thus, the range of seed yield variation under the influence of weather conditions was 24.0% (2.25 tons/hectare in 2022 and 2.79 tons/hectare in 2023), and oil yield from 1 hectare was 19, 7% (1.166 tons/hectare in 2022 and 1.396 tons/hectare in 2023). A somewhat smaller influence of the weather conditions of the year on the collection of oil from 1 hectare is due to the lower content of oil in the seeds in the sunflower of 2023, which is more favorable for plants.