Cold Damage on Canola
Posted by romeethredge on January 17, 2015
We had some low temperatures a week ago, 18 degrees, and we had damage to Canola and Carinata. A week later is a good time to assess the damage to see if the growing point is alive. Often leaves are burned back and killed but the growing point survives and the plant regrows rather quickly as it has a good rootsystem to help it bounce back. I looked at several fields this week and we do have some plant death, mainly in replant fields where the plants are very small and more susceptible to damage. Or, also we see it where we have small plants intermingled with larger plants for some reason. You can have some areas of fields affected worse as well like a bottom where it got slightly colder.
On the larger plants the effect is startling and looks terrible. The field looks white in some cases. It is bad and will set the plants back, but if they survive, they will regrow new leaves. So it really looks worse than it is in some cases.
In most of the fields I’ve been in we have pretty good survivability. I can see green growth at the center of the plant, the growing point.
Dr. Steve Olson, who is helping with the Carinata project, reports that some of those fields will have to be replanted. He mentioned that a good way to tell if plants are alive is to tickle them to see if they move back and forth, if they just go to one side and kind of collapse that’s not good.
Seminole Crop E News 
Climate and Agriculture in the Southeast | Cold damage to canola: Rome Ethredge said
[…] Rome Ethredge reported in the Seminole Crop E News this week that cold has damaged a lot of Canola and Carinata in southwest Georgia. Temperatures got down to 18 degrees a week ago and he says now is a good time to assess the damage. If the frost got down to the growing point, then the plant is dead and will need to be replanted, but if it only got the upper leaves, the plant should survive and put out new leaves. The most susceptible plants were the smallest, late-planted ones and the plants in low-lying areas which experienced the coldest temperatures. You can see more pictures and read about this at https://seminolecropnews.wordpress.com/2015/01/17/cold-damage-on-canola/. […]