Numerical Climatic Analysis of Soybean Development in Sowing Dates in Humid Subtropical Climate

Abstract The objective of this study was to determine the mean duration and the interannual variability of phenological subperiods and total soybean development cycle for 11 sowing dates in the humid subtropical climate conditions of the state of Rio Grande do Sul. Daily meteorological data were used from 1971 to 2017 obtained from the Pelotas agroclimatological station and from 1968 to 2017 from the main climatological station of Santa Maria. The soybean development simulation was performed considering three sets of cultivars of relative maturity groups between 5.9-6.8, 6.9-7.3 and 7.4-8.0, with intervals between the sowing dates of approximately 10 days, comprising September, 21 to December, 31. The data of phenological subperiods duration and total development cycle were subjected to the exploratory analysis BoxPlot, analysis of variance and mean comparison by the Scott-Knott test, with 5% of probability. The development cycle duration is greater in Pelotas than in Santa Maria. There was a decrease in soybean cycle duration from the first to the last sowing date for both locations. The R1-R5 subperiod duration is decreasing from October to December due to photoperiod reduction.