The objective of this literature review was to compile research findings on climate change and its impacts on crop production in Prairie Provinces of Canada. Our search strategy included finding primary literature articles from various databases. Seven articles reported increases in average and minimum air temperature over time in the Prairie Provinces of Canada. Increases in maximum air temperature were smaller than that for minimum air temperature. Growing degree days and corn heat units also increased over time, which has allowed for potential expansion of corn growth northwards. While overall increases in average annual precipitation and growing season precipitation have occurred in Canada between 1900 and 2021, western Canada showed increases in some regions but decreases in others. Off-season precipitation and snow cover duration in Canada have decreased since 1950. The number of frost-free days has increased across Canada, on the Prairies and southern Saskatchewan since 1900. Annual snowfall has decreased since 1950 and across Canada the annual maximum snow depth has also decreased. Overall, studies focusing on the Prairie Provinces in Canada have shown accelerated changes in several climate parameters over time, affecting cropping areas and crop yields.

The warming Canadian summers have become a major abiotic stress to crops, including pea. In the past decade, attempts were made in the understanding of heat stress effect and genomic mapping for heat-responsive traits in field pea. In this study, a new recombinant inbred line population (PR-24) consisting of 39 lines was tested in 6 trials in the summers of 2020 (near normal weather conditions) and 2021 (hot/dry conditions). PR-24 was phenotyped for days to flowering (DTF), days to maturity, plant height, lodging, yield components, plot yield, and seed quality traits. Plant height could be an effective indicator for yield prediction, because its correlation with plot yield was significantly positive in all six trials despite varying degrees of heat and drought stress. Under normal summer weather conditions in 2020, relatively late maturity was correlated with greater seed yield; under heat/drought stress conditions in 2021, successful pod development on the main stem was important for final plot yield. Linkage mapping was used to dissect the genomic regions associated with the measured traits. Four QTLs were identified over multiple trials, one each for DTF (chromosome 7), reproductive node number (chromosome 5), pod number (chromosome 2), and seed protein concentration (chromosome 5). Furthermore, two indices, i.e., stress tolerance index and geometric mean yield, previously used in drought tolerance assessment were validated as useful criteria for heat tolerance assessment in this study.

In pea, high temperatures during reproductive development lead to severe yield loss. Although the ovule is the seed precursor, studies elucidating the effect of heat on this plant structure are scarce. We investigated the impact of heat in the field and growth chamber on ovules 4 days after the open flower (4DOF) stage. Objectives were to identify associations between ovaries and plant performance, and to evaluate seed set and ovule abortion of heat-treated plants for six cultivars from a diverse range of seed-to-ovule ratios. In the field, plants were seeded at early (control, [early seeded pea, ESP]) and late (stress plant [late seeded pea, LSP]) periods in the season. In growth chambers, plants were exposed to heat (35/18 °C) at early flowering for 4 days and then evaluated at maturity. Stressed plants (LSP) displayed twice as many aborted ovules than ESP during early embryo growth (pro-embryo to globular stage) in synchrony with reduced ovaries, ovules, and embryo sac size. Cultivars with reduced ovary size at 4DOF were related to a high number of reproductive nodes and pods in LSP (r = −0.44 to −0.48). Similarly, under growth chamber conditions, heat caused seed reduction by increasing the abortion of immature ovules (early embryonic stages) at various reproductive nodes. Collectively, our results indicated that pea seed loss from heat in the field is largely due to early embryo abortion, a novel finding, rather than disruption of pre-fertilization events. Compensatory effects on plant performance infer plant resource adjustment. Our findings contribute to the assessment and selection of high-yielding pea cultivars for future warming seasons.

The objective of this research was to investigate the long-term trends in historical climate variables using the data collected near the classical Breton Plots (Alberta, Canada) and to determine if the data show any evidence of local climate change. The climate data used for the study were obtained from the Alberta Climate Information Service for the years 1901–2020. Various parametric statistical analyses were conducted to determine if monotonic trends occurred in the climate variables over time, and the analyses were conducted on the annual data as well as the 30 year climate normals. Large fluctuations in annual climate variables occurred, but a positive linear trend was observed in the average annual and growing season minimum air temperatures over time. Between 1901 and 2020 the annual minimum air temperature average increased at a rate of 0.3 °C for every 10 years. During the winter periods (December, January, and February, inclusive) from 1901 to 2020, the minimum air temperature average increased at an even higher rate of 0.5 °C every 10 years. Overall, the 30 year climate normals for minimum and maximum air temperatures increased for most seasons. The rates of increase were largest over the winter period, at 0.5 °C every 10 years for minimum air temperature and at 0.3 °C every 10 years for maximum air temperature. Strong linear increases occurred over time for growing degree days, number of frost-free days, total annual precipitation, growing season precipitation, and off-season precipitation.

Mango malformation disease (MMD) caused by Fusarium species has become an important disease of mango (Mangifera indica L.) orchards worldwide. In the Dominican Republic, MMD was first observed in 2008 in orchards of Azua and Peravia provinces, with incidence of up to 50%. This study aimed to estimate the malformation prevalence and distribution in the main mango growing areas of the Dominican Republic and to assess the susceptibility of six commercial cultivars commonly grown in this country. Mango malformation was found in 18 out of 58 orchards, all located in Peravia and Azua. Peravia showed the highest incidence, with values of up to 75% (2013) and 87.5% (2014), and the interpolative analysis made with ArcGIS showed this province as being more inductive for Fusarium spp. occurrence. Pathogenicity tests were conducted in 2013 and 2014 on 10-month-old healthy mango plants per cultivar. Inoculation was done by infiltration of Fusarium pseudocircinatum and Fusarium decemcellulare conidial suspensions into the vegetative apical buds, singly and in combination. In inoculated plants, symptoms such as loss of apical dominance, excessive proliferation of apical or axillary buds with thickened stems, and reduction of leaf lamina were associated with F. pseudocircinatum. In addition to these symptoms, leathery protuberant buds and eventual death of infiltrated plants were associated with F. decemcellulare, singly or coinoculated with F. pseudocircinatum. Based on a disease severity index (DSI), “Tommy Atkins” was tolerant (DSI = 7.8%) and “Puntica” and “Banilejo” were highly susceptible (DSI = 22% and 28.5%).

Melon's fruit skin quality is an agriculturally important and consumer-appealing trait. To identify molecular markers associated with fruit skin qualities, including reticulation and color, a total of 1200 Insertion/Deletion (InDel) markers randomly selected from the whole genome re-sequencing data of melon were combined with bulk segregant analysis to analyze a panel of melon genetic resources presenting reticulated- and smooth-skinned fruits as well as varying fruit skin colors. Four DNA bulks, including reticulated skin DNA bulk, smoothed skin DNA bulk, green skin DNA bulk, as well as white skin and light yellow skin DNA bulks, were developed. Four DNA pools were created by combining the DNA of 12 representative plants from each DNA bulk for polymorphism analysis, and 200 polymorphic InDel markers were selected. These polymorphic markers were used to characterize typical genetic bands within each DNA bulk. Two InDel markers, MC8-52 and MC4-7, were discovered to be related to fruit surface patterning (reticulated- and smooth-skinned fruits) and fruit color (green and white–light yellow fruits), respectively. These markers offer a high degree of detection accuracy. InDel marker MC8-52 on chromosome 8 achieved detection accuracies of 78.33% and 90.56%, whereas marker MC4-7 on chromosome 4 displayed detection accuracies of 92.92% and 83.35%, respectively. However, these markers were seen as a likely means of identifying strongly related markers for these traits. Hence, a high-resolution map of genomic regions carrying them is required for the development of highly linked markers for these traits.

Maize roots vary their growth in response to nitrate (NO^-₃) concentration in the environment, but growth plasticity differs among root types. We assessed the morphological response of lateral and axial roots on the primary, seminal, and crown root types exposed to 0, 1, 2, 3.9, and 7.8mmolL⁻¹NO^-₃. Higher NO^-₃ concentration did not change the growth of all axial roots and laterals of primary roots but caused positive quadratic growth in laterals of the seminal and crown root types. Maize root plasticity to NO^-₃ concentrations is the result of differential growth of laterals on seminal and crown root types.

Serotiny results in aerial seedbanks that enable persistence of some plant species by evading decay, predation, or lethal germination in the soil seedbank. Although more common in forestry, this concept has received little focus in weed science. On average, kochia [Bassia scoparia (L.) A.J. Scott] retained 2091 seeds plant⁻¹ (∼18.5% of seeds) in aerial seedbanks among 109 sample sites in spring, 7–8 months after senescence and following subsequent cohort emergence from the short-lived soil seedbank. Therefore, asynchronous seedling recruitment of kochia persisting in simultaneous aerial and soil seedbanks could represent an adaptive bet-hedging strategy for successful establishment in high-stress drought-prone environments.