A REANALYSIS OF THE EFFECTS OF TEMPERATURE AND IRRADIANCE ON TIME TO FLOWERING IN CHRYSANTHEMUM (DENDRANTHEMA-GRANDIFLORA)

A reanalysis of previously published data describing flowering responses to light integral and temperature in chrysanthemum indicates that, over a wide range of temperatures and light integrals, the rate of progress of flowering increases linearly with increasing light integral and effective temperature. Effective temperature is the sub-optimum temperature equivalent of a supra-optimum temperature in terms of developmental rate. At low light integral the rate of progress to flowering decreases more rapidly with declining light integral. The relationships are contrasted with recently published functional relationships describing flowering in chrysanthemum to light and temperature.