Cultivation of plants. The mysterious origin of cultivated plants

1 - garden strawberry; 2 - cabbage; 3 - pumpkin; 4 - gooseberry

§ 73. Origin of cultivated plants

Cultivated plants have evolved from wild species. Primitive found plants with edible seeds, fruits, roots. He collected wild plants. Later he began to grow them near his home. A man noticed that if you loosen the ground near the plants, destroy weeds, water the plants, they grow better, and their fruits, seeds, root crops become larger and tasty.

Most cultivated plants have ancient history, but some began to be cultivated more recently. So, wheat cultivated since the 7th millennium BC. e., potato, tomatoes 156 , sunflower - from the 16th century, and sugar beet - from early XIX in. Cultivation of wild plants continues in our time. Scientists study valuable wild plants, select the best ones and develop agricultural techniques for growing them. From generation to generation, the experience of growing plants was passed on. The man kept taking best plants, with the most valuable qualities for him.

Many cultivated plants have changed so much that they have become completely different from their wild relatives, and it is often very difficult to determine the origin of a cultivated plant. 143 .

With the accumulation of agronomic knowledge, human impact on the plant has increased. Appeared various varieties cultivated plants. A variety is a homogeneous group of plants with certain features and properties. In field crops, vegetable growing, the vast majority of plants propagate by seeds. At the same time, the characteristics and properties of the variety are preserved.

In fruit growing, a variety is a vegetatively propagated plant with more or less bright pronounced signs(crown shape, size, shape, color and taste of fruits, etc.) and properties (yield, durability, winter hardiness, drought resistance, resistance to pests and diseases, etc.). fruit plant grown from seeds does not repeat the properties mother plant. Long-term reproduction of the variety (many of them have been grown for centuries) in various conditions can lead to the accumulation of new features and properties. There are forms of the same variety. If the signs and properties of plants are very different from the original, maternal ones, then such plants are isolated into independent varieties.

New ways and methods for obtaining plant varieties are being developed by science selection(from Latin word"selection" - selection, selection) Breeders are engaged in breeding new varieties with the properties necessary for humans: high yield, resistance to diseases, adaptability to certain growing conditions.

Thanks to the work of our breeders, it was possible to significantly increase the yield of many crops. For example, wheat varieties bred in different years P. P. Lukyanenko (Bezostaya 1, Aurora, Caucasus), V. N. Craft (Mironovskaya 808, Mironovskaya Yubileinaya, Ilyichevka, etc.), with a yield under production conditions of 50-70 centners per hectare, is occupied in our country and abroad million hectares. Sunflower varieties bred by V.S. Pustovoit contain up to 57% oil in seeds. High Yielding Varieties Maize yields up to 150 kg/ha of grain on irrigated lands.

In order to obtain high and stable yields that will not depend on the vagaries of the weather, it is necessary to intensify the work on selection and the introduction of new varieties of agricultural plants. Plants of these varieties must meet the requirements of modern Agriculture: be resistant to adverse conditions, possess high quality grain and high yield. So, for example, the yield of winter wheat should not be lower than 80-90 c/ha, spring wheat - 4-5-60 c/ha.

Research institutes and centers for plant breeding have been set up in various regions of our country.

All new varieties are state test. The best varieties, which have successfully passed the test in this area and have shown an advantage over the varieties bred here, are recommended for cultivation, that is, they are zoned. Today, more than 5,000 zoned varieties are grown on the fields of collective farms and state farms, in gardens and plantations. Among the introduced into production are more than 500 varieties of grain crops, more than 100 varieties of potatoes, more than 30 varieties of sunflower, more than 750 varieties of vegetables and more than 15,000 fruit crops. 150-200 new varieties are released annually. Varieties whose qualities ceased to satisfy production are excluded from zoning.

1. What is the role of man in the creation of cultivated plants?
2. What are the oldest cultivated plants?
3. How they were bred different varieties cultivated plants?
4. What is selection? What is a grade?

Visit the nearest state farm, collective farm or experimental station; Get to know the varieties of cultivated plants grown in your area.

Korchagina V.A., Biology: Plants, bacteria, fungi, lichens: Proc. for 6 cells. avg. school - 24th ed. - M.: Enlightenment, 2003. - 256 p.: ill.

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Cultivated plants are so firmly established in human life that few people think about where the history of their cultivation began. Eating vegetables and fruits for food, a person does not wonder how their wild relatives look and how great the variety of cultivated plants is.

Historical facts

Almost all cultivated plants known today have their own historical roots, which determine the centers of their appearance and gradual transformation.

The origin of cultivated plants is attributed to 50,000-60,000 years BC. e. Until this period, the gathering of plants was the way of survival of the tribe, which was the responsibility of women. Historical evidence that people began to select large and healthy grains and fruits to grow near their homes are ancient utensils, pots with supplies in burials and their drawings.

To date, of the most popular 640 species of cultivated plants, about 400 of them are known to have come from South Asia, 50 from Africa, more than 100 from South and North America the rest are from Europe.

Interesting Facts about a cultivated plant, such as wheat, it is said that cereals were the first species that people began to consciously grow near their homes. This statement is confirmed by the oldest mortars and pestles found at the settlement sites.

Plant cultivation centers

In the 20th century, scientists were able to more fully determine where they came from modern views cultivated plants. Even N. I. Vavilov divided the geography of crop production into 7 zones:

So, South Asia became the progenitor of 33% of domesticated species. Cultivated plants (examples can be found in the writings of Vavilov), such as rice, cucumbers, eggplants and many others, came to us from there.
East Asia has given us 20% of cultivated species such as soybeans, millet, cherries, buckwheat.
Southwest Asia is rye, legumes, turnips, accounting for 4% of plants.
11% of known cultivated plants belong to the Mediterranean part. These are garlic, grapes, carrots, cabbage, pears, lentils and others.
Ethiopia has become the birthplace of 4% of species, which include chickpeas, barley, coffee tree.
Central America gave the world corn, pumpkin, tobacco, cocoa.
South America owns potatoes, coca, oki,

Wild relatives of all these plants can still be found. The interesting facts about the cultivated plant do not end there.

Selection in ancient people

You can hardly call cavemen or later types of human development breeders, but they had some skills in selecting and growing plants.

Archaeologists have come to the conclusion that agriculture and sedentary life as a way of survival became applicable 10,000 years ago. It is this period that is considered the beginning of the cultivation of plants. In fact, cultivated plants (examples of which archaeologists find at the sites of ancient sites) began to grow long before that.

Scientists suggest that the collected wild grains, stone berries and other plant species grew near the sites of ancient people when they spilled grain or threw away the bones along with the leftovers. It was customary for women of the tribe to pull out weeds near such "plantations", which has survived to this day.

Gradually, a person began to select the roots, grains and seeds of the most delicious and largest fruits and purposefully plant them near their homes. Thus, agriculture was born, which gave impetus to a new level of human development.

Variety of cultivated plants today

In our time, breeding has become a science that works not only on the yield of cultivated plants, but also on their palatability and increased survival. Almost all types of vegetables, fruits and cereals that he eats modern man, - hybrid, that is, artificially bred.

Interesting facts about a cultivated plant that has undergone not just selection, but crossbreeding with other species - this is what is obtained completely new organism, which has no analogues in nature.

Crossbreeds artificially bred in laboratories are a one-time seed, but thanks to them, the amount of tasty, giving high yield cultivated plants increased hundreds of times.

Today, hybridity has touched both fruits and vegetables that are well known to us, such as tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and many others.

Cultivated cucumbers

The cultivated plant cucumber is so familiar on our table, both fresh and canned, that we do not ask ourselves the question "where did it come from at all."

It turns out that the path of the cucumber to our table was rather big, since India and China are its homeland. Even 6,000 years ago, this vegetable was cultivated, although its ancient relatives still grow in Indian forests, like creepers, wrapping around and also use them for planting fences and hedges.

On the frescoes in Ancient Egypt, and then in ancient Greece, this vegetable was depicted on the tables of rich people and long time was available only to high-ranking persons.

The Greeks brought cucumbers to Europe, and their distribution became rapid thanks to palatability and the possibility of salting for the future for the winter. Today, this vegetable is available to everyone and everywhere. Every gardener considers it his duty to grow good harvest cucumbers, for which they are used as his varietal species, as well as hybrid ones.

Cultivation of indoor plants

People valued plants not only for their ability to be eaten, but also for medicinal properties as well as beauty. Interesting facts about the cultivated plant, which from the wild has become the standard of beauty and tenderness, concern the rose.

The rose has become a symbolic flower for many peoples since ancient times. So, according to Indian legends, beauty was born in a rosebud. She was dedicated to poems by poets in various countries and at all times, and her homeland was tropical Southeast Asia. It was from there that the cultivated plant rose moved to Ancient Greece, where it was called the flower of Aphrodite. AT Ancient Rome even put greenhouses for roses so that they bloom all year round.

Today, hundreds of varieties of this plant are known, bred by breeders for flower growers around the world.

Modern roses are grown in open field, in pots on windowsills, in greenhouses and winter greenhouses. They make delicious and healthy jam, and rose oil is considered one of the most expensive, since 500 kg of petals are used to obtain one kilogram.

cultural fruits

Just like cereals and vegetables, fruits became the object of cultivation among ancient people. Beneficial features berry and fruit plants, as well as the ability to store them in dried or soaked form, made them permanent objects of pantries. The best-known fruits are apples, wild relatives of which are found in the layers of the Cretaceous period, and dates. Today many fruit trees, which were considered foreign even 200-300 years ago, grow habitually in gardens on personal plots.

The future of cultivated plants

Breeders around the world are still working in their laboratories to create new crops that can take root in unusual conditions and produce unprecedented yields.

Thanks to their efforts, cultivated plants better tolerate climate change, the depletion of the soil layer of the Earth and at the same time give good yields.

Many cultivated plants began to produce two harvests per year or per season, as they received hybrid hardening. This gives hope that in the future there will be fresh vegetables and fruits, whose homeland has long ceased to be individual countries, but the whole world has become.

Primitive people got their food by hunting and gathering wild fruits, berries, nuts, tubers, bulbs and other parts of ancient plants rich in starch and other nutrients.

Hunting was not always successful, and not at every season there was an opportunity to collect plant food. But, collecting the fruits and roots of wild ancient plants, people noticed that seeds, tubers or bulbs dropped on the ground germinate. Then they began to collect and sow seeds, plant tubers and bulbs growing wild near their habitats.

To do this, they began to cultivate the land with a pointed stick. Later, a stone tip was attached to the end of the stick, which over time took the form of a hoe.

Even now in Indo-China and on the island of Java, when sowing rice, a pointed stick is used: it is used to make holes for planting grains in the soil. When man began to domesticate wild animals, he began to use them for cultivating the land, harnessing them to a primitive plow made from the root of a tree. The first such plows appeared, apparently, about ten thousand years ago in Mesopotamia.

With the development of agriculture, when people began to receive more or less constant crops from the fields they cultivated, the nomadic way of life was replaced by a sedentary one. arose permanent places settlements.

During the excavations of settlements 5-8 thousand years ago, scientists found hand mills, spinning and weaving tools. In the dwellings of people of that time, fabrics made from flax fibers are already found. Walnut and chestnut fruits, apple, pear and even grape seeds were also found there.

All this indicates a relatively high agricultural culture among the people who lived then.

For thousands of years, man has selected from ancient plants the most delicious and nutritious, giving largest harvest, and grew them near their dwellings.

He also improved the tools with which he cultivated the land. He began to apply fertilizers when cultivating the soil for crops. Expanded his knowledge of the nature and laws of development flora. Thanks to the selection of the best specimens of certain wild ancient plants and their care, man has created many plants that today are known to us only as cultivated: wheat, rice, corn, barley, soybeans, flax, sugar cane.

These plants gradually became unlike their wild ancestors.

Take cereals: wheat, rice, corn. Their grains contain a store of valuable nutrients- starch and proteins. By this, even in ancient times, they attracted the attention of man.

A grain of wheat was found in Egypt in the brick of a pyramid more than five thousand years old.

Wheat grains were also found in the remains of pile structures; they are at least four thousand years old. These grains are much smaller than current varieties.

Numerous names of wheat in ancient languages speak of the deep antiquity of this crop in the temperate climatic regions of Asia, Europe and Africa. Scientists suggest that wheat was cultivated even at a time when people did not have articulate speech and people explained themselves by signs and separate sounds, that is, about fifty thousand years ago.

Selecting the best varieties of wheat from the wild, man sowed them. In turn, from cultivated varieties, he chose those whose grains were larger and contained the largest number nutrients. Thanks to this selection and the simultaneous improvement of crop care, people created new varieties of wheat. Now there are over 4 thousand varieties of wheat. All of them differ from the ancient varieties in grain size and a large supply of starch and proteins in them.

Rice is an ancient cultivated plant. Rice is the staple food for half of the world's population. And now in India and Africa there are several types of wild rice. African wild rice produces good grain, which is collected by the population. This plant annually renews itself from self-sowing, but its grains fall off so early that the harvest has to begin long before full ripening.

Cultural rice was created by man in the same way as wheat, through centuries of selection and improvement in the quality of cultivation. Thanks to this, rice has acquired a number of valuable properties, necessary to a person and greatly distinguish it from its wild relatives. First of all, it is the undeliverability of grain.

The oldest cultivated plant - corn penetrated Europe, Asia and Africa after the discovery of America, its homeland. Her immediate relatives in America have not been found.

But there are two kinds weeds, whose relationship with corn is undoubted. How much corn has changed under human influence is evidenced by the following fact: in Mexico, in caves five thousand years old, corn cobs were found in the soil at various depths. The cobs found in the lower layers of the soil are much smaller in size and grain size than the cobs found in its upper layers.

This indicates relatively rapid changes in corn under human influence.

Potatoes, tomatoes became known in Europe also only after the discovery of America. The American potato was very small and bitter in taste. The Indians soaked it in water, dried it, and then ate it. We have never had to eat bitter potatoes, for many years ago people bred excellent varieties of large tasty potatoes from the American wild potato, and to this day they do not stop working to improve it.

Tomato - translated into Russian means " Golden Apple". There was a time when tomatoes were not eaten. They were planted in flower beds as ornamental plants. But since the middle of the last century, tomatoes have entered everyday life as food product first in Italy, and then in other countries of Europe and Asia. -

Also relatively recently, sugar beets, tea, coffee, hemp and other ancient plants began to be cultivated.

The remarkable English scientist Charles Darwin for the first time with great care collected a lot of facts about the changes in plants and animals under the influence of man. Based on them, he created his ingenious theory of the origin of species. He explained how pre-eating plants and animals change in the course of historical development, and proved that these laws underlie the transformation and creation by man of new forms of plants, new breeds of animals. The basis of this transformation is the ability of animals and plants not only to change under the influence of the conditions that a person creates for them, but also to transmit these changes to their offspring. But if Charles Darwin explained how plants and animals changed, then the great Russian scientist Ivan Vladimirovich Michurin, based on his teachings, developed the theory and methods for creating new plants. Here are the most important of these methods: crossing plants that are distant from each other in terms of their habitat and kinship, grafting, that is, the fusion of plant tissues different breeds, and, finally, the directed education of plants by changing the conditions of the external environment.

Thus, having learned the patterns of development of ancient plants, man became a transformer of nature, a conscious creator of new plants. He creates more and more new varieties of cultivated plants, continuously increasing their productivity, yield, as well as the quality of the products obtained from them.

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It seems to me that you have heard the term "cultivated plants" more than once in Everyday life. For the first time, this concept is mentioned in the lessons of natural history in elementary grades. secondary school. But in this article, I propose to reveal this concept more broadly, dwelling in detail on the types of these representatives of the flora of our planet, to understand the history of their origin and the benefits that they can bring to us.

Section 1. Cultivated plants. Concept definition

This type of plant, unlike wild plants, is specially grown by man. What for? Well, goals can be very different. As a rule, in order to obtain certain food products or feed for farm animals. Sometimes they are even used as medicines.

Scientists argue that a cultivated plant does not have its own range, which means that with the artificial creation of certain climatic conditions, it can be grown everywhere, i.e. regardless of the place of origin. However, unfortunately, neither species can spread naturally.

Section 2. Cultivated plants and the history of their "domestication"

If you delve into history, you can come to the conclusion that the cultivation of this type of plant began quite a long time ago, even at that time, along with hunting and gathering, the aborigine thought of growing what he needed. He began to collect the seeds and throw them into the previously loosened and moistened soil.

A little more time passed, and by that time he had already begun to lead a more settled life, he learned to take care of the crops quite tolerably. Of course, this required the expenditure of strength and patience, but the planted plants were regularly watered and freed from the ubiquitous weeds. Hedges were even erected around especially valuable varieties in order to protect the seedlings from being trampled or eaten by numerous animals.

At first, it was carried out quite unconsciously, and best crops selected on the basis of consumer qualities only, such as larger fruit or good taste. But it was this that subsequently led to the creation of cultivated plants.

The very first, still very primitive agriculture served as an impetus for the emergence major centers cultivation of one species or another. Subsequently, from these very centers, as a result of travel, wars and mass trade, representatives of the flora began to spread throughout the planet.

Section 3. Cultivated plants and their species

To be honest, there are several ways to classify all the cultivated plants on the planet. In this article I will try to talk about the most basic ones.

Quite often, these plants are classified based on their economic purpose. As a result, it turns out that the following groups exist:

fodder;
dyeing;
medicinal;
melliferous;
food;
spinning;
technical.

I was able to discover another classification, but due to its inconvenience, it is used much less often. In accordance with it, cultivated plants are considered on the basis of the substances contained inside and are:

alkaloid-containing;
protein-containing;
fibrous;
fatty oil;
starchy;
sugar-bearing;
essential oil.

But the most logical and most frequently used classification is considered to be based on the branch principle. In accordance with it, cultures are divided into:

vegetables (root, leafy, bulbous, fruit, aromatic, stem);
fruit (drupaceous, nut, pome, subtropical, citrus, berry);
field crops (melons (according to some scientists), legumes, cereals, tubers, forage grasses, root crops, cereals, medicinal, oilseeds, spinning, tobacco, essential oil).

In addition, two independent groups are distinguished: grapes and ornamental plants, which are engaged, respectively, in viticulture and floriculture.

At the dawn of mankind, people had to be content only with what surrounding nature. Our ancestors collected the fruits of different trees, berries, grains of wild cereals and seeds leguminous plants, dug tubers and bulbs. The transition from gathering to plant cultivation was a long one. Archaeologists believe that agriculture has existed for at least 10 thousand years, and attempts to cultivate plants began at least 40-50 thousand years ago. Even then, protecting the wild useful plants, women weeded the grass around them, loosened the soil.

Plants were introduced into culture in different ways. wild seeds fruit trees and berry bushes fell into the soil near a person’s dwelling and germinated here. People often spilled the grains of cereal plants near their homes on the ground containing a lot of decomposed garbage. Plants from such seeds developed much better than in the steppe or in the forest. This could lead our ancestors to the idea of growing them near their homes, instead of looking in the forests and steppes.

Primitive man collected plants that surrounded him: on the mainland of Eurasia - some species, in Africa - others, in America - still others. Therefore, many different species were cultivated on different continents. Most cultures come from Europe, Asia and Africa. Of the 640 most important cultivated plants the globe more than 530 come from these parts of the world, with about 400 from South Asia. Approximately 50 cultivated species have appeared in Africa, North and South America is the birthplace of more than 100 of them. There were no cultivated plants in Australia before the arrival of Europeans.

The doctrine of the centers of origin of cultivated plants was created by the outstanding Soviet scientist N. I. Vavilov. He established 7 main centers of their origin: 5 in the Old World and 2 in the New.

The most ancient of modern grain cereals are wheat, barley, millet, rice and corn. Cultivated wheat species originate from at least three wild cereals growing in Asia Minor, Southern Europe and North Africa. Wheat culture existed already in the Neolithic era. During excavations of Neolithic settlements in Europe, grains of wheat, seeds of peas, lentils and beans were found. Rice is native to India and Indochina. Many wild forms of this plant have been found there. Relatively late, around the beginning of our era, rye appeared in Transcaucasia or Asia Minor, and a little earlier - oats. Homeland of corn and potatoes - South and Central America. We owe to Peru and Mexico the appearance of cultivated species of tomatoes, capsicum, pumpkin, and beans. Central America gave the culture of tobacco, and North - sunflower. Vegetable crops - cabbage, turnip, radish, beets, carrots, onions - were known in ancient times and come from the Mediterranean.

in tropical countries South America yam (sweet potatoes), pineapple and peanuts were cultivated. Indochina gave oranges, lemons and other citrus plants. Coffee comes from Ethiopia - its wild ancestor still grows there. Tea is introduced into the culture in the mountainous regions of Burma. Cocoa was known in Mexico even before Europeans arrived there. Cocoa beans even played the role of money there.

In very distant times, man began to cultivate spinning plants. In Europe, flax was introduced into the culture, in China - hemp, in America and Asia - cotton.

Later, with the development of navigation, especially in the era of the Great geographical discoveries, began the migration of cultivated plants from one continent to another. So, corn, pumpkin, beans, tomatoes, peppers, sunflowers and tobacco migrated to Europe from America.

From year to year, from century to century, farmers, improving the methods of cultivating crops, simultaneously improved the plants themselves, selecting for sowing the seeds of the most productive of them or with some special valuable property.

The gradual improvement of cultivated plants was not a matter of one generation - it continued for millennia. Agricultural tribes gradually settled on the Earth, and cultivated plants spread along with them. With the appearance and spread of cultivated plants on Earth, the living conditions of people have changed. The emergence and development of agriculture has led to a huge shift in the history of human society.

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