Because of its greater oxidative oil stability, the high-oleate trait is of great interest to the oil seed processing industry. It is not known however, if the high-oleate trait expressed in oil seeds will influence seed germination and vigor potential. Experiments were designed to evaluate seed quality of both conventional and high-oleate soybeans and peanuts produced in cool and warm environments. Three soybean lines (normal-, moderate- and high-oleate) were grown at 22/18, 27/22, 33/22, and 38/27C day/night temperature. Three normal-oleate peanut cultivars along with their paired backcross-derived high-oleate lines were planted in greenhouses maintained at 22/18, 26/22 and 30/26C. High-oleate soybeans produced in 22/18C had significantly higher seed germination (99%) than those produced in warmer temperatures (62, 64, and 5% for 27/22, 33/22, and 38/27C, respectively). In contrast, the conventional soybean line had germinations of 97, 88, 82, and 75% when grown at 22/18, 27/22, 33/22, and 38/27C while a soybean line with moderately high oleic acid levels had germinations of 96, 89, 82, and 4% in the same environments. When averaged across the three normal-oleate peanut varieties, seed vigor as measured by electrical conductivity of seed soak water (EC), decreased as production environment temperature increased. For their high-oleate pairs however, EC was lowest, therefore vigor was highest, for peanuts grown in 26/22C (3.9 µmhos cm-1 g-1), followed by those in 30/26C (5.9 µmhos cm-1 g-1). Highest EC, lowest vigor, (6.8 µmhos cm-1 g-1) resulted from high-oleate peanuts grown in 22/18C. Our data suggests that high-oleate soybean and peanut seeds may be more sensitive to production environment than conventional varieties. High-oleate soybean seed germination decreased as temperature during seed fill increased and even moderate temperatures during seed development adversely influenced seed quality of high-oleate soybeans. For peanuts, either high or low production temperatures adversely affected seed vigor of high-oleate peanuts.
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