Influence of Genotype, Site, and Year on Maize Nutritive Value – Yield Relationships

Abstract

Maize genotype selection represents a practical tool influencing forage yield and quality. The main objective was to investigate the contribution of genotype, site, and year to variability of maize yield and quality in the environment of Central Europe. Totally 63 maize genotypes at 11 sites over a 7-year period were evaluated for dry matter yield (DMY), dry matter content (DM), starch, cob, neutral detergent fibre (NDF), in situ digestibility of stover NDF (NDFD), and organic matter (OMD). The genotype showed the highest variability from all factors where stover NDFD varied from 261 to 529 g kg -1 and stover OMD from 376 to 609 g kg -1 . In contrast to the whole-plant, variability of stover traits was more closely related to NDF than the DM content. Under standardized plant DM, all tested factors were significant and allowed interpretation of 70 and 60% of total variation of yield and quality for stover and whole plant, respectively. The average contributions of genotype, site, and year were 30, 7, and 5%, respectively. For variability in plant productivity and nutritive value, the importance of maize genotype selection was more than two times higher than the contribution of environment.breeding, hybrid, digestibility, multivariate method *

Effect of Row Spacing and Plant Density on Silage Maize Growth, Dry Matter Distribution and Yield

“…Biomass quality is generally driven by plant part ratio. According to Hakl et al [36], stover (i.e., leaves and stalks) parameters were able to account for about 60% of variability for the whole-plant yield and quality. Baron et al [56] noted the effects of plant density and row spacing on the qualitative parameters of silage maize, which could be associated with morphological changes induced by different spatial plant arrangements.…”

“…Forage yield is negatively correlated with qualitative parameters, especially plant digestibility and starch content. Starch content is closely related to ear ratio; therefore, ear ratio is a relevant factor for the nutritive value of the whole plant [36].…”

The Genotype and Crop Age Effect on Nutritive Value of Corn Forage

“…Superior hybrids reduce the negative influence of environment and increase the positive factors of hybrid yields (Yuwariah et al, 2020). One effective tool in influencing the production and the forage quality of maize crop is the selection of suitable maize genotypes (Hakl et al, 2017). Sufficient genetic diversity, heritability and genetic advancement under normal and heat stress environments are suitable for breeding improvement programs (Thapa et al, 2019).…”