Assessment of the Role of initial conditions in the setting of heterogeneity of functional Traits in a population of oilseed rape plants

Abstract

Individual plant models have been developed in recent years to satisfy different objectives. However most of them focus on average plant and do not integrate the variability observed in cultivated fields. Population scale models are often based on very simplified representation of the plant, and most of them remain theoretical. The objective of this work is to use an experimental design to select the main variables driving plant growth in order to use them as key factors in a plant population scale model. Destructive and non-destructive measurements were carried out from February to June. Measured variables are commonly used in such models. In our experimental conditions, local density has little impact on model outputs. On the contrary, the plant initial size is highly correlated to final height, dry mass and number of ramifications. This result confirms that variability within the field is very dependent on plant development at the first stages.