## 4 Discussion  
### Four Quality  
The ash content denotes the concentration of minerals in flour [20; 21; 22; 23]. The ash content not only affects the nutritional value of flour, but it also determines its technological quality and suitability for the production of various baked goods (for example, ash content does not exceed 5 g kg\({}^{-1}\) DM in cake flour, ranges from 7.0 to 7.8 g kg\({}^{-1}\) DM in bread flour, and exceeds 20 g kg\({}^{-1}\) DM in graham flour) [16]. The ash content of wheat grain is determined mainly by weather conditions, including temperature and precipitation [71; 99; 100; 101]. This observation was corroborated by the present study, which revealed a positive correlation between the crude ash content of flour and weather conditions during grain ripening. Unfavorable weather conditions during grain ripening decreased the accumulation of crude ash in the flour. The ash content of wheat flour was not influenced by the sowing date, sowing density, or split spring N rate, which is consistent with the findings of other authors [102; 103; 104; 8; 43; 51; 18; 105; 106; 107; 108; 109; 110; 111; 112; 113; 114; 115; 116; 117;  
The water absorption capacity of flour is an important parameter that affects the quality of baked goods [117; 118]. In the present study, delayed sowing increased the water absorption capacity of flour (by 1.1%p), and similar results were reported by [PERSON] et al. [119] (increase of 3.4%p). The observed increase in the water absorption capacity of flour could be due to the fact that late-sown wheat plants were exposed to high temperatures during grain ripening, which contributed to protein accumulation at the expense of the synthesis and storage of carbohydrates [99; 120]. According to [PERSON] et al. [121], delayed sowing modifies the starch quality by affecting its crystallinity and improving its pasting characteristics, but this effect may be reversed by an excessive delay in sowing [122]. In the works of [PERSON] et al. [92] and [PERSON] et al. [105], delayed sowing decreased the water absorption of flour by 1.1 and 3.9%p, respectively. The sowing density has a weak influence on the water absorption capacity of flour [[123; 124; 125; 126] and present study, Table 1], most likely due to the minor effect of this agronomic practice on the protein and starch contents of grain [127; 128; 129]. The only study where a higher sowing density increased the water absorption capacity of flour (by 2%) was conducted in northeastern China by [PERSON] et al. [111]. The increase in the water absorption capacity observed by the cited authors [111] could be due to a beneficial influence of a higher seeding rate on the starch content of wheat grain. The higher the starch content of wheat flour, the greater its ability to absorb water during dough mixing [130; 131]. Therefore, more water may be required to achieve the optimum dough consistency when using wheat flours with a higher starch content [120]. Split and late N applications can increase the water absorption capacity of flour [65; 65; 123]. [PERSON] et al. [65] found that the water absorption capacity of flour increased by 3%p when the total N rate was applied in three splits (BBCH 00, BBCH 30, and BBCH 45) rather than two splits (BBCH 00 and BBCH 30). In turn, [PERSON] et al. [64] reported that foliar N application during flowering (5 kg ha\({}^{-1}\)) and soil N in at the beginning of heading (40 kg ha\({}^{-1}\)) increased the water absorption capacity of flour by 2% and 4%, respectively. In the current study and in the work of [PERSON] et al. [52], split N application had no effect on the water absorption capacity of flour. In the work of [PERSON] et al. [52] and in the present study, the absence of correlations between N splitting and the water absorption capacity of flour could be attributed to the relatively low total protein content of winter wheat grain (128-139 and 129-132 g kg\({}^{-1}\) DM, respectively) as well as the weak effect of N fertilization on the protein content of grain (\(\pm\)3-5 and 2%, respectively).