Resumen
- The common cultivated oat (Avena sativa L.) is one of the world’s important cereal crops, with grain production currently at about 33 million metric tons per year (U.S. Dept. Agric. Statistics Service, 1994). Oat plant growth is favored by cool climates with the primary production occurring in the cooler temperate regions of the northern and southern hemispheres. Although there are fall-sown cultivars, spring-sown cultivars account for most of the oat grain production because of a general lack of winter hardiness in oat compared to other small grains. The proportion of land planted to oat has in general declined over the past 30 years, giving way to higher value small grains or oilseed crops; however, oat is still often grown for one or more of its attributes including high protein quality and content, good forage and bedding for livestock, a companion crop for forage legume establishment, adaptation to particular climatic zones, and as an integral part of a crop rotation program. Breeders’ concerns in addition to increased productivity of high quality grain and forage are primarily focused on disease resistance, particularly toward the fungal pathogens including rusts, smuts, and mildews and toward various viruses including barley yellow dwarf virus. There is also recent interest in developing specialty oat cultivars with modified grain composition for enhanced human or livestock nutrition or for possible specialty industrial uses.