Step 1: Understanding the Concept:
Crops resist water shortage through three broad strategies. Drought escape means completing the life cycle quickly before the dry period peaks. Drought avoidance means the plant actively limits water loss or increases water uptake so its internal tissues stay hydrated even while the soil is drying. Drought tolerance means the plant can keep functioning even after its own tissues have lost a lot of water.
Step 2: Key Formula or Approach:
To pick the drought avoiding crop among the options, look for physical traits that reduce transpiration loss or improve access to soil water, such as a deep root system, thick waxy cuticle, leaf rolling and quick stomatal closure.
Step 3: Detailed Explanation:
Barley is usually grown under cooler and comparatively moisture assured conditions and is not marked out for these avoidance traits.
Maize has a relatively shallow root system compared with sorghum and shows early leaf rolling and yield loss once soil moisture drops, which points more toward sensitivity than avoidance.
Sunflower carries large leaves with high transpiration demand and is generally described as sensitive at flowering and seed filling under moisture stress, not as a drought avoider.
Sorghum sends roots deep into the soil profile to keep reaching moisture that shallow rooted crops cannot access, carries a waxy bloom on its leaf surface that cuts direct water loss, and can roll its leaves and shut its stomata quickly when the atmosphere turns dry, all of which keep its internal water status close to normal even as the surrounding soil dries out.
Step 4: Final Answer:
Sorghum is the crop showing a drought avoidance mechanism among the given options, so option (3) is correct.