Lupin: The largest grain legume crop in Western Australia, its adaptation and improvement through plant breeding
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
11-29-2005
Journal Title
Australian Journal of Agricultural Research
ISSN
0004-9409
Keywords
dehydration postponement, drought escape, osmotic adjustment, root systems
Disciplines
Agronomy and Crop Sciences | Plant Breeding and Genetics
Abstract
Between 500 000 and 1 000 000 tonnes of narrow-leafed lupins (Lupinus angustifolius L.) are produced in Western Australia each year. It has become the predominant grain legume in Western Australian agriculture because it is peculiarly well adapted to acid sandy soils and the Mediterranean climate of south-western Australia. It has a deep root system and root growth is not reduced in mildly acid soils, which allows it to fully exploit the water and nutrients in the deep acid sandplain soils that cover much of the agricultural areas of Western Australia. It copes with seasonal drought through drought escape and dehydration postponement. Drought escape is lupin’s main adaptation to drought, and has been strengthened by plant breeders over the past 40 years by removal of the vernalisation requirement for flowering, and further selection for earlier flowering and maturity. Lupin postpones dehydration by several mechanisms. Its deep root system allows it to draw on water from deep in the soil profile. Lupin stomata close to reduce crop water demand at a higher leaf water potential than wheat, but photosynthetic rates are higher when well watered. It has been proposed that stomata close in response to roots sensing receding soil moisture, possibly at a critical water potential at the root surface. This is an adaptation to sandy soils, which hold a greater proportion of their water at high matric potentials than loamy or clayey soils, since the crop needs to moderate its water use while there is still sufficient soil water left to complete its life cycle. Lupin has limited capacity for osmotic adjustment, and does not tolerate dehydration as well as other crops such as wheat or chickpea. Plant breeding has increased the yield potential of lupin in the main lupin growing areas of Western Australia by 2–3 fold since the first adapted cultivar was released in 1967. This has been due largely to selecting earlier flowering and maturing cultivars, but also to improved pod set and retention, resistance to Phomopsis leptostromiformis (Kühn) Bubák, and more rapid seed filling. We propose a model for reproductive development in lupin where vegetative growth is terminated in response to receding soil moisture and followed by a period in which all assimilate is devoted to seed filling. This should allow lupin to adjust its developmental pattern in response to seasonal conditions to something like the optimum that mathematical optimal control theory would choose for that season. This is the type of pattern that has evolved in lupin, and the task of future plant breeders will be to fine-tune it to better suit the environment in the lupin growing areas of Western Australia.
Recommended Citation
French Robert J., Buirchell Bevan J. (2005) Lupin: the largest grain legume crop in Western Australia, its adaptation and improvement through plant breeding. Australian Journal of Agricultural Research 56, 1169-1180. https://doi.org/10.1071/AR05088
