The effects of difrent seeding rates on grain yield and some grain yield components in two bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) varieties

The present study was conducted during the 2013-2014 winter growing seasons at one site in Kırşehir ecological condition and the experimental design was a completely randomized blocks of split plot a with three replications. Two bread wheat cultivars (Pehlivan and Tosunbey) were grown with eight seding rates (350, 400, 450, 500, 550, 600 650, 750 seeds m−2) for determining of the most suitable seeding rates for the cultivars in terms of yield and yield components. In the study, average grain yield of Tosunbey bread wheat variety was found to be higher than the average grain yield of bread wheat variety Pehlivan. The grain yield of Tosunbey cv. in the study was determined as 245.3 kg da-1, while the grain yield of Pehlivan cv. was 220.5 kg da-1. Grain yields were changed between 165.5 kg da-1 and 291.3 kg da-1 according to the effecting of seeding rates. Grain yield was highest with 600 seeds m−2 primarily due to the higher number of spikes per unit area. Consequently, grain yield and plant height were increased with optimum seeding rates, and then they decreased with the highest seeding rates. Spike number per square meter increased in all cultivars, whereas grain number per spike, grain weight per spike and 1000 grain weight declined with the increasing of the seeding rates. As conclusions, Tosunbey bread wheat variety has more grain yield, compared to Pehlivan bread wheat variety, moreover 600 seeds m−2 seeding rate may be suggested for Kırşehir ecological conditions. Key Words: Seeding rates, bread wheat, grain yield, some yield components