New Zealand Journal of Crop and Horticultural Science abstracts
Cadmium concentrations in some New Zealand wheat grain
C. W. GRAY
R. G. MCLAREN
Soil, Plant and Ecological Sciences Division
P. O. Box 84
Lincoln University
Canterbury, New Zealand
email: graycw@lincoln.ac.nz
A. H. C. ROBERTS
AgResearch
Ruakura Agricultural Research Centre
Private Bag 3123
Hamilton, New Zealand
Abstract The variation in wheat (
Triticum aestivum L.)
grain cadmium (Cd) concentrations between different cultivars was investigated
along with a preliminary ranking of soil properties in terms of their
importance in controlling wheat grain Cd concentrations. Results indicate that
there is considerable variation in Cd concentrations in New Zealand wheat grain
samples. The mean Cd concentration for wheat in this study is 54 μg
kg
-1 fresh weight (FW). Ten percent of the grain samples examined in
this study are non-compliant with the maximum permissible concentration (MPC)
for Cd in wheat grain. However almost 50% of non-compliant samples were found
at a single site, and at a n
umber of sites no samples exceeded MPC. There was a 4-fold range in the
abilities of different wheat cultivars to accumulate Cd in grain. There was
also seasonal variation in Cd uptake for wheat cultivars grown at the same
site. Extractable soil Cd using a weak salt reagent yielded the highest
correlation with grain Cd concentrations in spring wheat across all soils,
whereas no significant relationships were found for winter wheat. There were no
significant simple correlations between major soil properties and wheat grain
Cd concentrations for either winter or spring wheat. For winter wheat, a
multiple regression model with terms for total zinc (Zn) and CaCl2-extractable
Cd yielded the highest correlation with winter wheat Cd concentrations
(r2 = 0.59 P < 0.05). Low Cd accumulating wheat
cultivars can be selected for use at sites where the Cd concentration in grain
exceeds the MPC. Future work is required to determine which soil properties are
important in controlling wheat grain Cd concentrations.
Keywords phytoavailability; soil; cultivars; zinc
H00050
Received 15 December 2000; accepted 11 April 2001
New Zealand Journal of Crop and Horticultural Science, 2001, Vol. 29:
125-136
0014-0671/01/2902-0125 $7.00 (c) The Royal Society of New Zealand 2001
PDF file of entire paper: medium quality (879K); (scanned from paper original: notes about this process)
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