Abstract:
In 1994, LINTUL-POTATO was published, a comprehensive model of
potato development and growth. The mechanistic model simulated early crop processes
(emergence and leaf expansion) and light interception until extinction, through leaf
layers. Photosynthesis and respiration in a previous crop growth model—SUCROS—
were substituted by a temperature-dependent light use efficiency. Leaf senescence at
initial crop stages was simulated by allowing a longevity per daily leaf class formed,
and crop senescence started when all daily dry matter production was allocated to the
tubers, leaving none for the foliage. The model performed well in, e.g., ideotyping
studies. For other studies such as benchmarking production environments, agroecological
zoning, climatic hazards, climate change, and yield gap analysis, the need
was felt to develop from the original LINTUL-POTATO, a derivative LINTULPOTATO-
DSS with fewer equations—reducing the potential sources of error in calculations—
and fewer parameters. This reduces the number of input parameters as well as
the amount of data required that for many reasons are not available or not reliable. In
LINTUL-POTATO-DSS calculating potential yields, initial crop development depends
on a fixed temperature sum for ground cover development from 0% at emergence to
100%. Light use efficiency is temperature dependent. Dry matter distribution to the tubers starts at tuber initiation and linearly increases up to a fixed harvest index which is
reached at crop end. Crop end is input of the model: it is assumed that the crop cycle
determined by maturity matches the length of the available frost-free and or heat-free
cropping season. LINTUL-POTATO-DSS includes novel calculations to explore tuber
quality characteristics such as tuber size distribution and dry matter concentration
depending on crop environment and management.
