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Requirements for climate and soil
As Khorasan wheat is an ancient cereal species, the climatic requirements still correspond very well with the region of origin, i.e. the fertile crescent in the Middle East. A temperate continental climate with cold nights in the early spring (see vernalisation), low to moderate precipitation rates (500-1000 mm per year), and a sunny warm summer for optimal ripening are therefore the typical preferred climatic conditions of Khorasan wheat. That’s very similar to the durum wheat, which originates in the same region. But, because breeding efforts for Khorasan wheat have been very little (see chapter below), the adaptation to other climatic conditions is still limited. In general Khorasan wheat seems to be less susceptible to environmental stress, than common wheat. That characteristic is similar for most of the ancient grains. Especially the drought tolerance is well known for Khorasan wheat, which is even better than the one of durum. Too much precipitation especially in the end of the season usually even leads to dramatic disease problems (see chapter below).

Soils typically used for Khorasan wheat are the same as for durum wheat: deep friable black clays with a certain water storing capacity, also known as vertisols.

Cultivation management, harvest and post-harvest treatment
The cultivation practices are quite similar to other wheat species, especially durum. As most of the Khorasan wheat is organically produced, the nutrient supply (especially nitrogen) should be granted by using an appropriate crop rotation, such as previous pasture legumes. The nutritional content of Khorasan wheat is the most important characteristic of this crop and the reason why it is cultivated. Therefore the nutrition supply is one of the critical aspects of this production. Harvest in general follows the same procedure as in the other wheat species. As soon as the grains are mature, a combine harvester threshes the Khorasan wheat. But contrary to common wheat, the seeds of Khorasan wheat are very brittle and crack in half very easily, which leads to a necessarily more gentle harvest and post-harvest treatment. Thinking of post-harvest treatments, the special physical properties of the Khorasan grain may cause difficulties (literature on that topic is still scarce). Storage may be more difficult because of a higher water capacity of the grains, the milling has to be adapted because of the big grains (should not be a problem in modern mills, in general) and the whole transportation machinery must deal with higher weight, because the Thousand Kernel Weight (TKW) is very high.

Growth, development, physiology
Khorasan wheat is a tetraploid wheat subspecies, which means that the general biological properties resemble more or less the one of durum wheat. To just summarise the most important things about wheat in general: wheat is a cereal and therefore biologically a grass plant. Their strategy of reproduction focuses on the production of a huge amount of pollen, which is then spread by wind. The pollen is located in the typical anthers. As wheat is self-fertilizing the production of grains within a field of wheat is usually granted without any further managing intervention.

Diseases
The range of diseases in Khorasan wheat is more or less the same as in all other wheat species. Main diseases are typically caused by fungi, such as the Fusarium Head Blight or the "black tip". Khorasan wheat has been found very susceptible to Fusarium Head Blight. The big problem of Fusarium is the toxicity to animals and humans. Because of the high susceptibility to fungi, crop rotation is quite important, especially under organic production conditions. The rotation requirements resemble more or less the ones of durum wheat. Depending on the specific production setting, Khorasan production after maize or other cereals should be avoided. Typical robust rotations would contain some of the following crops: canola, sunflower, pulses, sorghum and pasture legumes.

Aspects of breeding
The traditional aim of plant breeding is to improve the agronomic or nutritional qualities of a crop. Typical goals are improved yield, reduced susceptibility to diseases and pests, homogeneous maturation (to optimize harvest) and increased tolerance to environmental stresses, i.e. drought, acid soil, high or cold temperature etc. Most of the known wheat species today are polyploid. The polyploidy is a result of breeding procedures in the second half of the 20th century. The reason to create polyploid species was (and still is) overcoming the sterility of many plants after the breeding process. Whereas common bread wheat is hexaploid, Khorasan wheat is tetraploid (Singh A. 2007). To do further breeding with this tetraploid Khorasan wheat, the genetic pool to use is a little bit limited to the tetraploid subspecies of triticum turgidum such as Durum(subsp. durum), Polish (subsp. polonicum),Persian (subsp. carthlicum), Emmer (subsp. dicoccum and Poulard (subsp. turgidum) wheat. Especially to develop resistances against common fungi (e.g. Fusarium Head Blight), this genomic pool is interesting. Problematic in this case, is the economic unimportance of most of the tetraploid subspecies of wheat (except Durum), which limits the investment to do intensive breeding, especially compared to the highly important common bread wheat.

As mentioned above, until now the only commercial production of Khorasan wheat is done under the label of Kamut®. Breeding is therefore not allowed, as the label requires remaining original. As the agronomic potential of Khorasan wheat still is quite low, breeding would be very interesting or even necessary. Probably, Khorasan wheat has to be pushed by Kamut® first to become more interesting for other producers, which may then go into further breeding with other Khorasan cultivars.