The potential for corn on the Canadian Prairies, as revealed by recent U.S. research on corn hybrids, is huge, says a leading Canadian corn expert.
But prairie farmers will probably fall further behind Americans because there is little research being done on varieties designed for Western Canada.
“We have the heat units. We have the hybrids,” said Loraine Bailey, a corn expert from Brandon.
“If we had a corn breeder in this general area that would use the genetic material that’s available to create the hybrids, we would burst into the big time.”
Read Also
European wheat production makes big recovery
EU crop prospects are vastly improved, which could mean fewer canola and durum imports from Canada.
Bailey said corn could be grown across the southern black soil grain belt, all the way west to Indian Head, Sask., and much more of Alberta and Manitoba could be seeded to the crop.
The development of corn hybrid breeding in the United States allowed corn yields to explode in recent decades, with varieties produced by mixing various lines having far higher yields and beneficial characteristics than either of the parent lines.
Recently, the corn genome has been unraveled and scientists are beginning to understand what might be giving corn hybrids their added strength, or “hybrid vigour.”
Scientists from the University of Minnesota, Iowa State University and the University of Florida discovered that two lines of corn – B73 and Mo17 – had large genetic differences, including 180 genes present in B73 that weren’t in Mo17.
They suspect roughly the same number of genes in Mo17 may also be missing from B73.
“The genomes of two corn strains are much more different than we would have thought,” said Minnesota plant biologist Nathan Springer in a university release.
“What struck us is how many major changes there are between two individuals of the same species.”
The difference, which is almost as large as the genetic difference between chimpanzees and humans, could be the source of the extra productivity in hybrids: the offspring get to take advantage of more genes than either parent has.
Springer said these results may help researchers develop varieties that have specific uses or do particularly well in specific environments.
That’s what could benefit the Prairies most, Bailey said. The Canadian Prairies are on the northern extremity of the corn growing region, but hybrid varieties that can handle the lower heat units and shorter season could stretch the corn belt wider.
“Easily we could double the seeded acreage in Manitoba in grain corn production,” said Bailey.
“There could be fantastic acreage in Saskatchewan.”
But without dedicated corn research scientists, those hybrids might never be developed, he cautioned.
