Wheat Seed Treatment in Australia Research Paper

Wheat Seed Treatment in Australia - Research Paper ExampleSeeds are subject to attacks not only outwardly but also internally as fungi or bacteria may attach to their coating or even within eventually cause plant diseases. The dangers that threaten seeds are present during storage and after planting. The soils upon which seeds are deep-seated also contain fungi and bacteria that could harm them and the degree to which they could adventure seeds depend upon the condition of the soil at the time seeds are planted, which do not favour fast germination. Seed treatment had been practiced as first as 60 A.D. when seeds were treated with wine and crushed cypress leaves to deter insects from destroying them while in storage (Munkvold et al. 2006 7). Also, during the Egyptian and Roman periods sap from onion was apply in the Middle Ages, chlorine salts and liquid manure, and in the 1600s, hot water started to become a ST method, one that is still being used even to this twenty-four hour period (Australian Seed Federation 2010). The earliest treatment for chaff seeds was accidentally discovered in the 17th century when a ship carrying a load of wheat grains sank. When grains that got soaked in the seawater were recovered from the sunken ship and were planted they produced plants that have less bunt or stinking smut than the usual crops planted using ordinary seeds. Thus, soaking seeds in seawater became one of the earliest treatments to seeds to prevent bunt until in the year 1750 a Frenchman discovered that salt and scatter can control bunt in wheat significantly. The advent of the mercurial compounds in the 1920s, although later banned, had revolutionised contemporary seed treatment (Munkvold et al. 2006 7).