Winter planting

The stability of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) yield under rainfed Mediterranean conditions can be improved by winter planting of cultivars resistant or tolerant to Ascochyta blight [Ascochyta rabiei (Pass.) Lab.]. A fi eld study was conducted in southern Spain to evaluate the eff ect of diff erent planting dates (late autumn, early winter, mid-winter and the traditional late winter planting date) on growth and yield for two chickpea cultivars: ‘Fardón’ (Ascochyta blight resistant) and the widely grown, local cv. ‘Pedrosillano’ (not Ascochyta resistant and with fungicide treatments applied). Grain yield for late autumn and early and mid-winter planting dates was between 50 and 80% greater compared to the traditional late winter planting date. Th e earliest two planting dates had no signifi cant diff erences for yield. Rainfall during the growing season had a strong eff ect on biomass production and grain yield for all planting dates. Th e leaf area duration (LAD) index displayed a strong positive correlation with both dry matter production and grain yield, although variations in spring weather conditions prompted a year × planting date interaction. Plant density was the component most infl uencing yield; both plant density and pods plant–1 were greater for earlier planting dates. ‘Fardón’ was less productive than ‘Pedrosillano’ (averaging 1.76 vs. 1.94 t ha–1 over all planting dates, respectively). However, there was likely little profi tability for Pedrosillano due to the fungicide applications