17 June 1994 Research Set to Boost Lotus Seed Production

Thanks to the work of a Lincoln University honours student and her research supervisor there's good news in the offing for the seed industry with the identification of an optimum harvest time for Lotus pedunculatus, a pasture species particularly suitable to hill country terrain.

Kirsty Sanders, from Maruia Valley, near Murchison on the South Island's West Coast, will present research findings on Lotus pedunculatus to the Agronomy Society at the annual conference of the New Zealand Institute of Agricultural Science in Palmerston North in August.

Under the supervision of Dr Jacqueline Rowarth of Lincoln University's Plant Science Department, Kirsty has been examining aspects of seed production in Lotus pedunculatus and Lotus corniculatus.

These two species, which are not related to the "lotus eaters" plant of the same name, are tolerant of low fertility, acid soils and as such could be useful in hill country environments. In fact they are grown already as a pasture species, but the low availability and consequent high price of seed has always been a hindrance to wider use.

To achieve quantity and quality from a seed crop it is necessary to know when to harvest, and this has been the issue Kirsty has been working on with Dr Rowarth. Flowering patterns have proved the key to calculating optimum harvest time and these will be the basis of the presentation to the Agronomy Society.

Kirsty's interest in the matter was kindled while she held an inaugural AgResearch Summer Scholarship last year which, during the University vacation, involved her in work on lotus with AgResearch, Lincoln. From there she has continued with lotus flowering and seed production as a project for her honours degree in Agricultural Science, which she will complete this year.

Kirsty has stamped her Lincoln career with a distinctive mark of achievement. In the first year of her studies she won the valuable Elders Pastoral Scholarship for academic excellence and in this final year of her degree she has won an equally prestigious Agriculture New Zealand Scholarship in Farm Management.

The daughter of David and Carol Sanders, who farm a 688-hectare sheep and beef property in the Maruia Valley, south of Murchison, Kirsty was educated at Maruia Primary School before going on to Middleton Grange School, Christchurch.

A keen outdoors person, she says she has worked on the family farm "ever since I can remember". Kirsty's long-term goal is farming, but in the immediate future she may work in an area such as agricultural research or farm advising.

Ian Collins, Journalist, Lincoln University, Canterbury, New Zealand.