nitrogen and tillers

"nitrogen clearly increases chlorophyll content, which last year increased yield. but this year nitrogen increased canopy temperature. this means plants lacked enough water to transpire and stay cool. winter and spring brought too little precipitation to recharge the soil. plots with plenty of nitrogen saw leaves wither and die. plants failed to develop properly before building seed heads. the parching affected all plots, but the richer ones looked worse." __________________________________________________________ "all in moderation including n" from land report number 103 summer 2012 from the land institute. _________________________________________________________ the curled leaves on the zea diploperennis (top photo) show that the stoma had closed due to the amount of water the plants had transpired and they had gone into a conservation mode ( a good dousing with the hose and they were uncurled in about twenty minutes )...when i mulched that bed last autumn i used around fifty pounds of composted manure as part of the mulch so there has been plenty of nutrients, including nitrogen, for the plants to draw on this season ( i have actually put over a ton of compost in that 160 square feet over the last three years...between that and the cowpeas there should still be a lot of nitrogen around )...they are as verdant as they were last season but there has been much less in the way of precipitation and a lot more applied water...it rained quite a bit yesterday morning but thirty-six or so hours later the plants needed more water...the perennial teosinte seems to be much more sensitive to water loss than either the annual or the maize ( although the maize has had curled leaves this season as well ) so the dryness, heat, and increased chlorophyll must be have something like the impact they're having on the land institute's wheat grass...so there is such a thing as too much fertility depending on climatic conditions ( so i may have to temper my immoderation in the use of compost and cowpeas...i don't do aristotelian moderation at all well...another garden challenge)...and so we're back to the question of whether the outrageously warm march and the dry, hot summer are anomalous or if this is the new normal...too early to tell isn't it? still more plants to grow and still more data to collect and still more work to do in collecting native, perennial plants to use as a yardstick of climate and adaptation...doesn't look short-term to me...the second photo is of the zea diploperennis and its tillers while the third is the tillers on the hopi blue maize...just more morphology and another link between teosinte and maize that i put in because i am so completely geeked by both plants and inordinately pleased that they are co-operating so well...the fourth photo is a full stalk shot of the hopi blue plants and the bottom one is northern tepehuan teosinte ( just so the annuals get some attention)