Zhao Shuwen, Luzhou Observation, Zhou Mengying, text/photo
Recently, rows of seedlings in the Luxian base of the Rice Sorghum Research Institute of the Sichuan Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Shuizhulin Village, Yuchan Street, Luxian County, are neat and tidy, and the seedlings appear exceptionally green under the sunshine. If you look closer, each seedling is labeled pink and white.
"This label is the 'ID card' of the rice, and the number on it is their 'ID number', in order to facilitate the screening and selection of rice seeds in the later stage." Li Yun, a researcher at the Sichuan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, said that after the seeds of these rice were transported from Hainan to Lu County, they were labeled and called "Nanfan" seeds.
That is to say, from sowing to maturity and harvesting, they need to wear "ID cards", so that in the process of growth, scientific and technological personnel can observe and record the growth and characteristics of each variety.
"The most important thing when transplanting is not to make a mistake with the 'ID card' of rice, otherwise the later observation and cultivation will be affected. When planting seedlings, we pay attention to shallowness and stability. This is conducive to making rice tillering faster and more abundant, and it is easy to judge the advantages and disadvantages. According to Yang Bo, an assistant researcher at the Rice Sorghum Research Institute of the Sichuan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, the white label represents the maintainer line in hybrid rice, that is, the paternal rice; The pink label represents the sterile line, i.e. the mother rice.
"Hybrid rice varieties are produced by crossing with sterile lines (female parents) and restorer lines (paternal parents), and sterile lines cannot be self-crossed, so they need to be crossed with the maintainer lines, and the characteristics of the sterile lines are maintained by maintaining the characteristics of the sterile lines, that is, reproducing sterile lines." Yang Bo said.
In the fields, villagers with their sleeves rolled up and straw hats pulled out the two kinds of rice, bundled and sorted them one by one according to their signs, and then stacked them neatly and transported them to another Honda for transplanting. On the other side of the paddy field, more than 700 newly sown restoration lines have just sprouted, broken out of the soil, and are still in the growth period.
"We calculate the sowing time according to the growth period of the hybrid rice parents, and wait until mid-July, when the transplanted rice is heading and flowering, we can use the 'restorer line' and 'sterile line' that are just heading, so that we can breed heat-resistant, high-quality, and stable yield varieties to meet the diverse farming needs of the masses." Yang Bo said.
Recently, more than 800 "Nanfan" rice seedlings from Hainan have all been transplanted and are waiting for harvest in August.
"After this batch of rice matures and is harvested, we will make a comprehensive selection according to the characteristics of compounding, sterility, heat tolerance, plant leaf type and other traits, and select high-quality varieties, and then we will complete the whole process of 'planting two seasons in Hainan and one season in Luxian County'." Yang Bo said that these high-quality seeds will also be sent to Hainan for a new round of planting, so as to cultivate and research more high-quality rice seeds.