Variability of Leaf Phosphorus among Sugarcane Genotypes Grown on Everglades Histosols
1997
Glaz, Barry | Deren, Christopher W. | Snyder, George H.
The P content of drainage water of the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA) of Florida must be reduced by at least 25% from a baseline mean calculated using 1978 through 1988 data. This minimum P reduction is one of several measures to sustain much of the unique habitat of remaining natural regions of the Everglades. The objectives of this study were to evaluate variability in leaf tissue P concentration among elite sugarcane (interspecific hybrids of Saccharum spp.) clones and to recommend sampling strategies to detect differences among clones. Leaf samples were collected four times per annual crop in the plant-cane and first-ratoon crops from three fields, representing low, medium, and high available soil P. Leaf P of sugarcane should be tested at several locations in at least two crop years, and at least once, but preferably twice per crop. The clone with the most leaf P had 0.65 g P kg⁻¹ leaf tissue more than the clone with the least. This difference among leaves allowed us to speculate that P removal may differ by about 8.5 kg ha⁻¹ among commercial cultivars and that genetic improvement of this trait could be feasible. If further studies show that differences in leaf P concentration can reliably predict differences in total P removal from a sugarcane field, then classification of cultivars for leaf P concentration could make available to EAA sugarcane farmers another best management practice (BMP) to reduce P content of their drainage waters.
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