European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322

www.elsevier.com/locate/eja

Spatial field variations in soybean (Glycine max [L.] Merr.)

performance trials affect agronomic characters
and seed composition
J. Vollmann a, *, J. Winkler b, C.N. Fritz a, H. Grausgruber a, P. Ruckenbauer a
a Agronomy and Plant Breeding Department, University of Agricultural Sciences Vienna, Gregor Mendel-Str. 33, A-1180 Vienna, Austria
b Saatzucht Gleisdorf GmbH, A-8200 Gleisdorf, Austria

Accepted 4 August 1999

Abstract

The objective of this study was to investigate field trends in agronomic characters of soybean (Glycine max [L.]
Merr.) performance trials. Field experiments were arranged as lattice designs, and for each plot within an experiment,
an environmental covariate representing the spatial trend was calculated using neighbour analysis. Correlations
between environmental covariates of different characters were then used to analyse the degree of similarity in their
spatial trends. Grain yield, seed protein content, and seed size were more influenced by spatial variations than time
to flowering, time to maturity, and oil content. Significant correlations between environmental covariates were found,
which demonstrate the similarity of trend patterns in different characters within particular experiments. In field trials
exhibiting a high degree of spatial heterogeneity, correlations between environmental covariates of grain yield and
protein content were highly positive. This indicates that field conditions, which promote grain yield, would also
enhance protein content. Moreover, the observed trend patterns considerably affected the calculation of phenotypic
coefficients of correlation between grain yield and seed protein content. The results suggest that spatial analysis should
be applied to all characters of interest, when field conditions are not homogeneous. 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All
rights reserved.

Keywords: Grain yield; Neighbour analysis; Seed protein content; Soybean; Spatial heterogeneity

1. Introduction such as water and nitrogen content ( Kirda et al.,

Heterogeneity within experimental fields, which
may affect yield and other characters of a crop,
can often be seen in large agronomic experiments.
This field heterogeneity or spatial variation usually
indicates the presence of soil fertility gradients,
which might be due to trends in soil parameters
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +43-1-47654-3309;
fax: +43-1-47654-3342.
E-mail address: hans.vollmann@iname.com (J. Vollmann)
1988; Mulla et al., 1992; Wade et al., 1996),
element concentration (Berndtsson and Bahri,
1995), organic carbon content (Ball et al., 1993),
or soil physical properties (Becher, 1995). In plant
breeding trials, spatial variation affects the ranking
of genotypes (Brownie et al., 1993; Stroup et al.,
1994) and broadens the experimental error vari-
ance (Ball et al., 1993; Brownie et al., 1993; Helms
et al., 1995; Vollmann et al., 1996a). This could
cause a decreased response to selection and a
reduced precision of statistical testing procedures.

1161-0301/00/$ - see front matter 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S1 1 6 1 -0 3 0 1 ( 9 9 ) 0 0 04 2 - 8
14 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322
Moreover, estimates of heritability and other
genetic parameters might be biased by field hetero-
geneity (Rosielle, 1980; Magnussen, 1993; Helms
et al., 1995). In agronomic trials, treatment effects
could be masked by spatial variations, thus prohib-
iting the identification of the most favourable
agronomic treatment (Scharf and Alley, 1993).
In order to monitor and control spatial field
variation statistically, a number of different con-
cepts and procedures, such as incomplete block
designs, neighbour analysis, trend analysis, or
correlated error models, have recently been dis-
cussed and evaluated comparatively using yield
data (e.g. Brownie et al., 1993; Stroup et al., 1994;
Grondona et al., 1996; Gleeson, 1997). Although
substantial effects of spatial heterogeneity on grain
yield have been demonstrated, spatial methods of
analysis are rarely being considered for characters
other than grain yield. In wheat, field trends in
seed size, test weight, seed protein content, element
concentration of seed, and plant height have been
reported from production fields and from plot
trials (Rosielle, 1980; Mulla et al., 1992;
Berndtsson and Bahri, 1995). In soybean trials,
characters such as seed size, seed protein and oil
content, symbiotically fixed nitrogen and fibrous
root area have been adjusted for spatial hetero-
geneity in order to enhance the precision of experi-
mental results (Herridge and Rose, 1994;
Pantalone et al., 1996; Rosielle, 1980; Rebetzke
et al., 1998). In barley, environmental trends have
been observed among scores of powdery mildew
in an experiment on disease control (Hackett
et al., 1995).
Despite the numerous reports on spatial vari-
ability in field trials, the related effects of spatial
heterogeneity on different agronomic characters
within the same experiment have never been con-
sidered explicitly, and trends occurring in several
plant traits have not been compared, although
they might be caused by variations in the same
soil parameters. Therefore, the objective of this
study was to analyse the influence of spatial trends
on agronomic and seed compositional traits within
soybean performance trials by using covariates
from a neighbour analysis procedure. Further-
more, the influence of field trends on the estimates
of correlation between agronomic and seed quality
characters was investigated.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Experiments
During the present study, seven different soy-
bean performance trials ( Table 1), which had been
grown at Raasdorf, Lower Austria (10 km east of
Vienna, Austria, 4812 N, 1632 E), between 1995
and 1997, were analysed for spatial field variations
in different agronomic characters. The soil type at
the experimental site was classified as a chernozem
of alluvial origin. Each performance trial was
originally planted as a generalized lattice design in
two replications at a plot size of 5.51.25 m with
four rows per plot. The trials designated EXP1,
EXP2, and EXP5 in Table 1 comprised genotypes
of soybean maturity groups 0000 ( Fehr and
Caviness, 1980), which were F -derived lines in
2
F or F generations from crosses between high-
5 6
yielding and high-protein parents. The trials desig-
nated EXP3, EXP4, EXP6, and EXP7 involved
F -derived breeding lines of soybean maturity
5
group 00 in F or later generations, which had
7
been pre-selected for yield performance in earlier
experiments.
In all experiments, soybean seeds were
inoculated with Nodular-G (Serbios, Badia
Polesine, Italy), a commercial preparation of
Bradyrhizobium japonicum ( Kirchner) Jordan, in
order to promote nodulation and symbiotic nitro-
gen fixation. Mineral nitrogen was applied at a
rate of 30 kg ha1 prior to sowing. In addition,
phosphorus and potassium were provided prior to
seed bed preparation at rates of 70 kg ha1 P O
2 5
and 140 kg ha1 K O, respectively.
2
2.2. Data collection
Field data of time to flowering, time to maturity,
duration of reproductive phase and plant height
were collected as one single reading per experimen-
tal plot. Time to flowering and time to maturity
were expressed as the number of days required to
reach the R1 (beginning of bloom) and R8 (full
 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322 15

Table 1
Experimental designs of seven different soybean performance trials grown in three years, and the efficiency (%) of lattice analysis as
an indication of the presence or absence of effects of spatial variations on agronomic and seed compositional characters

Design/character Experiment

1995 1996 1997

EXP1 EXP2 EXP3 EXP4 EXP5 EXP6 EXP7

Lattice designa 106 66 55 55 105 55 55

Number of entries 60 36 25 25 50 25 25
Lattice efficiency (%)
Time to flowering 100.0 101.1 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.1 100.0
Time to maturity 168.6 104.0 104.4 100.0 114.1 121.4 114.6
Reprod. phaseb 136.2 110.8 104.5 100.0 100.4 101.7 118.3
Plant height 235.6 117.7 106.0 124.3 104.7 100.0 100.0
Grain yield 198.3 210.9 143.3 402.8 135.6 100.6 108.7
Protein content 405.0 180.3 140.3 147.7 109.3 104.9 100.0
Oil content 197.6 116.7 100.0 133.3 107.8 106.2 109.6
Protein plus oilc 250.7 157.2 110.0 123.1 100.0 102.0 100.3
Seed size 314.8 204.7 129.3 150.3 103.7 122.6 100.0

a Generalized lattice design: Number of incomplete blocksnumber of plots per block.

b Duration of reproductive phase (R1R8 in days).
c Sum of protein and oil content.

maturity) developmental stages, respectively,
according to Fehr and Caviness (1980).
For determination of protein and oil content, a
25 g sample of dry seeds from each plot was finely
ground and scanned by near-infrared reflectance
spectroscopy (NIRS) using an InfraAlyzer model
450 spectrophotometer and IDAS calibration soft-
ware (Bran and Luebbe, Norderstedt, Germany).
Seed protein content, oil content, and the sum of
protein and oil content were expressed in g kg1
on a dry matter basis. Seed size [weight of 1000
seeds (g)] and grain yield (kg ha1) were expressed
on an 8% seed moisture basis.
2.3. Statistical analysis
Experimental data were subjected to a lattice
model of ANOVA, and the F-test was applied to
examine the statistical significance of genotype
differences for the characters investigated. The
generalized lattices were also regarded as random-
ised complete block designs with additional restric-
tions within replications (Cochran and Cox, 1957).
For this reason, the lattice experiments were fur-
ther analysed as randomised complete block
(RCB) designs in order to compare the two
designs. Moreover, the efficiency (%) of lattice
analysis relative to randomised complete blocks
(Cochran and Cox, 1957) was calculated to com-
pare the degree of spatial variation in the different
characters within each experiment, as detectable
by lattice analysis.
For the application of neighbour analysis, indi-
vidual plot residuals were calculated for each
experimental plot and for each character as:
e =x x: ,
ij ij i
where e denotes the plot residual, x the observed
ij ij
character expression of genotype i in replication j,
and x: the arithmetic mean of genotype i. Plot
i
residuals of particular neighbour plots (Fig. 1)
were then used to calculate environmental covari-
ates for each experimental plot. Following the
designation introduced by Stroup et al. (1994) for
long and narrow plots, longitudinal neighbour
covariates were referred to as eastwest ( EW )
covariates. Neighbour plot covariate EW1 was
calculated as the arithmetic mean of the eastern
and the western nearest-neighbour plots, which is
identical to the earliest nearest neighbour analysis
16 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322
Fig. 1. Schematic representation of the neighbour analysis
methods applied. In EW1, EW2 and EW3, the residuals from
1, 2 or 3 neighbour plots, respectively, are used as an environ-
mental covariate to correct the plot value of a test plot for
field trends.
method proposed by Papadakis (1937). Covariates
EW2 and EW3 were calculated from plot residuals
of two ( EW2) or three ( EW3) plots ( Fig. 1) at
each side of a test plot, respectively, because the
use of two or more neighbour plots for describing
a local trend could improve the efficiency of analy-
sis in particular experiments ( Vollmann et al.,
1996a). For border plots missing particular neigh-
bours, covariates were calculated without the resid-
uals of those plots. Subsequently, a combined
analysis of variance and covariance was carried
out according to the model:
x =m+t +bEW +e ,
ij i ij ij
where x denotes the character expression of geno-
ij
type i in replication j (=plot value), m is the overall
mean value, t denotes the effect of genotype i, b
i
indicates the regression coefficient of the EW
ij
covariate used, and e represents the random error
ij
term. For each analysis of variance, one additional
degree of freedom was allocated to the regression
coefficient because residuals were calculated from
genotype means as concomitant covariates (Pearce
and Moore, 1976). Block effects were ignored
when applying the neighbour analysis, because the
concept of blocking would establish artificial
boundaries between neighbouring plots falling in
different blocks (Brownie et al., 1993).
Generalized lattice designs were analysed using
the PLABSTAT software program ( Utz, 1988).
Plot residuals and covariates from neighbour plots
were calculated from the raw data using a spread-
sheet program, Corel Quattro Pro (Corel, Orem,
UT ) and the appropriate field layout information.
Combined analysis of variance and covariance as
well as the adjustment of entry means by neighbour
covariates were carried out using the GLM pro-
cedure and the LSMEANS statement of the SAS
program (SAS Institute, 1988). Phenotypic and
genetic coefficients of correlation between charac-
ters were also calculated with PLABSTAT; as there
is no adequate test of significance available for
examining genetic coefficients of correlation
(Thomas and Tapsell, 1985), the standard errors
of the coefficients were used as an indicator of
their significance.
3. Results
As an indication of the presence of spatial field
trends detectable by lattice analysis, the efficiency
of lattice designs is presented in Table 1 for
different soybean performance experiments and for
all characters investigated. Differences in the effi-
ciency roughly demonstrate that distinct characters
were affected by spatial field variations to a clearly
different extent: time to flowering, time to matu-
rity, the duration of the reproductive phase, and
oil content were generally less influenced by spatial
variations than grain yield, protein content, and
seed size. Moreover, differences in lattice efficiency
can also be recognized between different years:
lattice efficiencies were higher in the 1995 and 1996
trials than in 1997, which suggests that seasonal
effects influenced the magnitude of spatial varia-
tions at a given experimental site.
Comparative results of different ANOVA
models for controlling spatial variations in grain
yield, protein and oil content, and seed size are
summarized in Table 2 using the EXP2 experiment
as an example. The highest residual error mean
squares and CVs were obtained when the random-
ised complete block analysis was applied. Residual
 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322 17

Table 2
Comparison of various ANOVA models for the control of spatial variation in four characters of the EXP2 experiment

ANOVA model Grain yield Protein content Oil content Seed size

MSEa P (F )b CV, % MSEa P (F )b CV, % MSEa P (F )b CV, % MSEa P (F )b CV, %

RCBc 175 126 0.001 17.5 421 0.179 7.0 145 0.001 5.3 74.0 <0.001 5.5
66 latticed 83 023 <0.001 12.0 234 0.038 5.2 124 <0.001 4.9 36.7 <0.001 3.9
EW1e 71 751 <0.001 11.2 334 0.181 6.2 131 <0.001 5.0 46.2 <0.001 4.4
EW2e 77 168 <0.001 11.6 272 0.040 5.6 137 <0.001 5.2 36.3 <0.001 3.9
EW3e 86 096 <0.001 12.3 263 0.061 5.5 126 <0.001 4.9 33.5 <0.001 3.7

a Residual error mean square.

b Probability value of entry-H from F-test.
0
c Randomized complete block design.
d For the lattice design, the effective error MS is presented instead of the residual error MS, which only covers the intra-block error.
e Neighbour analysis using EW1, EW2, or EW3, respectively, as neighbour covariate.

error mean squares were drastically reduced by

lattice or neighbour analysis in all characters
except oil content, which seemed to be less affected
by spatial heterogeneity in this experiment. In seed
protein content, significant genetic differences
between entries could only be detected by lattice
or EW2-based neighbour analysis, as revealed by
the respective F-tests. Correspondingly, residual
error mean square was similarly reduced after
lattice or neighbour analysis of different characters
in the other experiments investigated (results not
shown).
The EW2 residuals of the EXP2 experiment
were further utilized to visualize field trends in
four different characters ( Fig. 2): Rather similar
patterns of trend can be recognized for grain yield,
protein content, and seed size, whereas the trend
lines of oil content show a pattern that seems to
be opposite to those found in the other characters.
The view of trend similarities between grain yield
and other seed characters of the same experiment
is further supported by the significant and close
correlations between the respective EW2 residuals
(Fig. 3). Apart from EXP2, similar correlations
between EW2 residuals of different characters were
detected in other experiments grown in different
seasons ( Table 3). Positive correlations between
EW2 residuals were found between grain yield and
protein content, and between grain yield and seed
Fig. 2. Field trends of grain yield, protein content, oil content
size. This suggests that soil properties within and seed size in each of the two replications grown in two
heterogeneous fields, which improve grain yield consecutive blocks of 36 plots of the EXP2 experiment, as
also boost both seed protein content and seed size. revealed by EW2 neighbour residuals.
18 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322
Fig. 3. Relationships between EW2 neighbour residuals of grain
yield and seed characters for the EXP2 experiment.
Negative correlations between EW2 residuals were
always found between grain yield and oil content,
and between protein and oil content. These correla-
tions between environmental covariates were sta-
tistically significant even in the EXP5 experiment
( Table 3) as well as in the two other 1997 experi-
ments (data not shown), although spatial field
variations were only present at a lower degree in
the 1997 season according to the respective lattice
efficiencies computed ( Table 1).
Both the phenotypic as well as the genetic
coefficients of correlation between different charac-
ters of the EXP2 experiment are presented in
Table 4 for three ways of adjustment of field data
for spatial variations. Genetic coefficients of corre-
lation were rather similar for each of the three
methods of statistical analysis, although the esti-
mated levels of significance tended to be higher
after lattice or EW2 adjustment than after RCB
analysis. Considerable differences were found
between particular phenotypic coefficients of corre-
lation after an adjustment of field data. The pheno-
typic coefficient of correlation between grain yield
and protein content was low (r=0.18) and statis-
tically not significant, when calculated from unad-
justed genotype mean values after RCB analysis.
However, when using lattice- or EW2-adjusted
means, the correlation between grain yield and
seed protein content was clearly negative ( Table 4).
An even more drastic influence of data adjustment
on the relationship between grain yield and protein
content was found in the EXP1 experiment. In
this case, the estimate of the genetic correlation
between yield and protein content was
r =0.70, whereas the correlation between EW2
g
residuals of the two characters was r=+0.69
(Table 3). The apparent lack of a significant phe-
notypic correlation between the two characters
[Fig. 4(a)] might be due to a complete balancing
of the negative genetic correlation by the positive
correlation between EW2 residuals, which describe
the environmental variation. After adjusting geno-
typic mean values by EW2 values and lattice
analysis, which were the most efficient procedures
in terms of a reduction of residual error mean
square for grain yield and protein content, respec-
tively, the phenotypic correlation between the two
characters clearly changed to negative [Fig. 4(b)].
4. Discussion
The results of the current investigation clearly
demonstrate that soil heterogeneity in soybean
performance trials may simultaneously influence
agronomic characters such as grain yield, plant
height, seed size, and protein and oil content. This
fact and its consequences have not been considered
in recent reviews on methods of controlling spatial
variations in breeding experiments (Brownie et al.,
1993; Stroup et al., 1994), which dealt with varia-
 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322 19

Table 3
Coefficients of correlation (r) between EW2 residuals from a neighbour analysis of different characters in three performance trials
grown in different years

Character Time to maturity Grain yield Protein content Oil content Protein plus oila

EXP1

Time to maturity
Grain yield +0.47**
Protein content +0.33** +0.69**
Oil content 0.18 0.45** 0.34**
Protein plus oila +0.26** +0.51** +0.89** +0.13
Seed size +0.29** +0.41** +0.48** 0.05 +0.48**
EXP2

Time to maturity
Grain yield +0.09
Protein content 0.28* +0.83**
Oil content +0.21 0.57** 0.48**
Protein plus oila 0.18 +0.61** +0.85** +0.07
Seed size +0.51** +0.80** +0.58** 0.36** +0.44**
EXP5

Time to maturity
Grain yield +0.43**
Protein content +0.04 +0.29**
Oil content +0.06 0.31** 0.84**
Protein plus oila +0.17 0.02 +0.37** +0.24
Seed size +0.65** +0.53** +0.14 0.02 +0.21*

a Sum of protein and oil content.

tions in grain yield only. However, variations in
soil parameters have been reported from pro-
duction fields, which affected different plant
parameters such as element concentrations in grain
(Berndtsson and Bahri, 1995) or grain yield and
protein content of wheat (Mulla et al., 1992) in a
correlated manner. Therefore, the available meth-
ods of spatial analysis could be applied to any
character of interest, when statistically detectable
soil trends are present in one trait. Although
spatial trends were very similar for different traits
of the same experiment in the present study ( Figs. 2
and 3), a different statistical model might be most
adequate for each of the traits in order to reduce
the residual error mean square ( Table 2). In gene-
ral, however, lattice analysis and the methods of
neighbour analysis were far more efficient than the
randomised complete block analysis in modelling
spatial variations. Moreover, in regular field plots
of long and narrow shape, the use of two or three
neighbour plots residuals ( EW2 or EW3) at each
side of a test plot was often more efficient than
using only one nearest neighbour for covering a
field trend ( Table 2), which is in agreement with
earlier findings ( Vollmann et al., 1996a,b).
Negative correlations between soybean yield
and protein content within different populations
have been well established by numerous breeding
studies (e.g. Leffel and Rhodes, 1993; Wilcox and
Cavins, 1995). For this reason, the unexpected
finding of a highly positive relationship between
the field trends ( EW2 residuals) of grain yield and
protein content ( Table 3 and Fig. 3) deserves
additional consideration. As genotype effects are
omitted through the calculation of neighbour cova-
riates, the correlation between EW2 residuals of
grain yield and protein content has to be regarded
as a purely environmental correlation (Bos and
Caligari, 1995). Therefore, a variation in environ-
mental parameters such as nitrogen availability
from mineralization, symbiotic N fixation and
2
many other factors, which can promote both yield
20 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322

Table 4
Phenotypic (above diagonal ) and genetica (below diagonal ) coefficients of correlation (r) between different characters of the EXP2
experiment at three ways of analysis of field data

Character Time to maturity Grain yield Protein content Oil content Protein plus oilb Seed size

RCB (unadjusted)c
Time to maturity +0.80** 0.20 +0.38* +0.12 +0.50**
Grain yield +0.96++ 0.18 +0.34* +0.11 +0.61**
Protein content 0.41+ 1.10+ 0.51** +0.64** 0.12
Oil content +0.51++ +0.79++ 0.79++ +0.33 +0.35*
Protein plus oil +0.24 0.29 +0.14 +0.49+ +0.18
Seed size +0.51++ +0.61++ 0.50+ +0.54++ +0.17
Lattice adjustmentd
Time to maturity +0.78** 0.41* +0.41* 0.02 +0.48**
Grain yield +0.83++ 0.49** +0.42* 0.10 +0.56**
Protein content 0.53++ 0.73++ 0.40* +0.61** 0.34*
Oil content +0.48++ +0.62++ 0.44++ +0.48** +0.35*
Protein plus oil 0.04 0.13 +0.54++ +0.51++ 0.03
Seed size +0.49++ +0.57++ 0.46++ +0.43++ 0.06
EW2 adjustmente
Time to maturity +0.83** 0.33 +0.31 0.04 +0.51**
Grain yield +0.92++ 0.42* +0.32 0.12 +0.54**
Protein content 0.53++ 0.96++ 0.46** +0.56** 0.33*
Oil content +0.38++ +0.56++ 0.72++ +0.48** +0.35*
Protein plus oil 0.11 0.38 +0.20 +0.53+ 0.00
Seed size +0.51++ +0.57++ 0.61++ +0.45++ 0.12

a Significance of a genetic coefficient of correlation is expressed as being greater than once (+) or twice (++) its standard error.
b Sum of protein and oil content.
c Correlations based on unadjusted entry means from the randomized complete block analysis.
d Correlations based on entry means adjusted by lattice analysis.
e Correlations based on entry means adjusted by neighbour analysis using the EW2 neighbour covariate.

and protein content of a soybean crop (Soldati,
1995), could explain the positive correlation
between the trends in grain yield and protein
content in all experiments investigated.
The effects of spatial variations on the results
of performance trials have been characterized as
influencing the ranking of genotypes (Stroup et al.,
1994), thus reducing selection efficiency, and
inflating residual error variance, which reduces the
power of statistical tests and biases the estimates
of heritability as well as other parameters (Ball
et al., 1993). In the case of spatial variations in
several characters, coefficients of phenotypic corre-
lation ( Table 4) and estimates of correlated
response to selection can also be biased. Using
unadjusted field data, the relationship between
yield and protein content [Fig. 4(a)] would suggest
that a selection for one character would not influ-
ence the other character. However, a negative
correlation between grain yield and protein content
is evident after appropriate adjustment of the field
data for spatial trends [Fig. 4(b)].
The empirical results obtained from the current
investigation of different soybean trials demon-
strate that spatial variations can affect various
agronomic characters, revealing similar patterns
of trend in each of the traits, and affecting the
estimates of phenotypic correlation between traits.
Different statistical methods such as lattice analysis
and various neighbour or trend analysis techniques
are available for an efficient monitoring of field
variations and for adjusting treatment means.
Apart from covering fertility trends in yield trials,
the adjustment for spatial trends in all agronomic
characters of interest could be useful in different
fields of agronomic and plant breeding research,
e.g. in selecting for seed quality characters such as
protein and oil content.
 J. Vollmann et al. / European Journal of Agronomy 12 (2000) 1322
Fig. 4. Relationship between grain yield and seed protein
content of the EXP1 experiment based on unadjusted entry
means (a) or on entry means adjusted for spatial field variations
(b) using EW2 and lattice adjustment for grain yield and seed
protein content, respectively.
Acknowledgements
A research grant provided by the Austrian
Science Foundation (FWF Research Project No.
P10663-OBI ) is gratefully acknowledged. Thanks
are also due to L. Feiertag and S.J.H. Kuijt for
assistance in seed quality determination.
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