๐๐๐๐ง๐ฎ๐ญ ๐ฉ๐ซ๐จ๐ฃ๐๐๐ญ:
The goal was to identify promising cultivars for easy cultivation in a natural and arid environment, without irrigation.
So, as is my habit, I gathered a large number of accessions: 15 local cultivars from very diverse origins: North America, South America, Europe, China, and Africa.
Plus one wild peanut accession from the Amazonian jungle.
Then I placed them in extreme conditions: a slightly late sowing in an arid location and cultivation without irrigation.
Followed by an overly late harvest in clay soil (early December, after prolonged wet weather and several days of frost down to โ7ยฐC).
When I started this crop this spring, I knew nothing about peanuts, and I must say that these plants genuinely impressed me: very few crops would have been capable of such resistance to drought and heat.
Under severe water stress, their foliage can close, reducing exposure to the sun and limiting evaporation.
During this period, the flowers withered; most accessions waited for more favorable conditions at the end of summer before beginning to set pods, while others, exhausted by the summer, lacked the vigor to do so.
The growing conditions did not allow a proper comparison of plant habit: bushy in cultivated types, and more prostrate and runner-like in the wild plants.
I was nevertheless able to observe that some produced their pods in a more clustered manner on the roots than others.
The pods display a wide spectrum of textures, ranging from smooth to very deeply sculpted.
The wild accession from the Amazonian jungle has particularly rough pods.
Unsurprisingly, the smoothest pods were more resistant to water and insect penetration, while the roughest degraded rapidly.
A large number of pods rotted in the soil:
And in the days following harvest:
In some cultivars, all pods were destroyed.
At the end of this harsh selection, a few accessions clearly stood out.
Everything that survived was harvested without distinction and will be replanted together next year.
