Write up from the 2005 Wimmera R&D Field Day

Our 2005 Wimmera Research & Demonstration Field Day drew a large crowd of Wimmera and southern Mallee farmers.  You can read what some of the speakers had to say by reading down the page, or jump directly to a particular speaker using the links below.

Aerial view of our Wimmera Research & Demonstration site near Marnoo.

• Oilseed varieties - Steve Marcroft 
• Crambe – Sue Knights
• Barley varieties - David Moody
• Quasar barley - John Chew
• Wheat varieties - Harm van Rees
• Pasture varieties - Michael Grant
• Stripe rust - Brooke Thompson
• In-crop risk management - Harm van Rees 
• Alternative fuel discussion - Stewart Rendell

Juncea canola

Brassica Juncea (B.Juncea) canola (or mustard) has been bred to produce exactly the same oil as canola, therefore it can be taken to the same receival site.  B.Juncea is quite vigorous as a seedling and has excellent blackleg resistance, although this may change when we have a Juncea industry.  It is heat tolerant and resistant to pod shattering, so it does not have to be windrowed.

In areas that achieve canola yields of 1t/ha, Juncea may be an option.  If canola yields are above 1.5t/ha, you would stick to canola.

Juncea is in commercial seed production this year and next year.

Monola

Monola has very high oleic acid and is a very stable oil.  The market for monola oil is a lot higher than the current canola oil market.  Monola may become a predominant crop in the future, instead of canola.

New varieties are yielding similar to Sapphire, with good blackleg resistance.  There is a $40/t premium for growing monola.

Diseases of canola

The main disease is still blackleg. Cut across the stem down near the roots and check the inside of the stem for discolouration.  If there is greater than 50 percent discolouration, then you are starting to get yield loss from blackleg.

Crambe is in the same family as canola (Brassica), but is high in erucic acid (32-40 percent). It is an industrial oilseed, used as a slip agent and plasticiser and can be further processed as a pharmaceutical and cosmetic.

The line that is being promoted around southern Australia was developed in the UK, and has not really been trialled out here. It will be interesting to see how the 3000-4000ha of crambe that is growing under contract around throughout southern Australia goes.

Crambe was grown in the Geelong area in the 1970s and work has been done with crambe in the Mallee. With the price of oil, these things rear their heads as renewable sources of oil for industrial purposes.

Crambe has a yield limitation because there is only one seed per pod. It can also be problematic because it is hard to get the husk off the seed. Crambe is a light crop and freight costs become an issue. As oil is currently being processed in Numurkah, the western-most production boundary for freight to be economical would be Horsham.

There is little genetic diversity within the species, so breeding for improvements is problematic. There has been talk about using genetic mutations to improve the species.

Fifty-two chemicals are registered to use on crambe (basically the same as those used on conventional canola).

The positives of crambe are: it provides another option, another species and oilseed in the rotation; it is shorter season (which is possibly where the drought tolerance comes from); other weed control option before you put the crop in.

They are saying crambe yields similar to canola, but Sue said it did not yield as high as the shorter season canola.

The oil is different compared to safflower, but yields similarly. Both could be spring sown. Crambe could perform better in northern Victoria.

The seeds do not shatter, so there is no need to windrow, reducing production costs.

If you are crunching numbers for a comparison, budget 80 percent of your canola yield.

Diseases of crambe

Crambe suffers similar pests and diseases as canola. With regard to blackleg, it is really untested in this area.

Barley varieties – David Moody      

The newest malting varieties available over the next 12 months that are the most relevant here are: Buloke, Flagship and a Gairdner replacement. The name of the Gairdner replacement is yet to be decided, for now we will refer to it as Gairdner Plus.

Buloke and Flagship are both suited to the export brewing markets, which account for 85 – 90 percent of the sales of Australian malting barley. The requirements of the domestic brewing industry, which produce a relatively large proportion of low alcohol beer, are very different, and Buloke and Flagship are not suited to this market. It is important to mention that the domestic malting industries service both the domestic and export brewing industries and hence are likely to be interested in Buloke and Flagship for their export customers. The export grain marketers are obviously also likely to be interested in these varieties. It was hoped that there would have been a considerable amount grain and malt of these varieties sent overseas to help develop markets prior to their release, but because of the poor seasons in 2003 and 2004, none of the commercial scale crops were of suitable quality for market development. To compensate, there are a large number of commercial trials of Flagship and Buloke in the ground this year, so hopefully by the end of 2006 a number of key markets will have had a "taste" of these varieties.

Gairdner Plus is likely to be marketed into existing Gairdner markets.

In choosing between these three varieties, and others on the market, the key issues to consider are:

1. whether or not you require CCN resistance; this depends on your cropping rotations and often whether or not you are growing a CCN resistant wheat. One CCN susceptible crop in a four year rotation will not cause CCN problems.
2. how important variety differences in grain plumpness are in your success of achieving malting quality. If a lack of grain plumpness is not a regular reason for you failing to make malting specifications, you have much more flexibility in choosing varieties
3. whether you think the seasonal outlook (at sowing time) is favourable or unfavourable.

Of the three mentioned varieties, Buloke was the highest yielding in trials in the Wimmera over the last three years; 10 percent higher than Schooner and significantly higher than Gairdner. It seems Buloke is suited to dry years. However, Buloke lacks CCN resistance. It will be interesting to see the difference between Gairdner and Buloke in good years. Buloke is similar to Schooner in maturity and is targeted at the northern Wimmera and Mallee districts in Victoria. Seed is available through AWB Seeds, and AWB Seeds is working actively with the grain marketers to determine the best locations for segregation.

Flagship's main advantage is that it is CCN resistant; the disadvantage of Flagship is that it is 5-6 percent lower yielding than Buloke and is prone to pre-harvest sprouting. Flagship performed exceptionally well in the favourable year of 2001 and has very good leaf disease resistance. It may be a variety for more favourable years. A commercial seed agent for Flagship is yet to be appointed.

Flagship and Buloke have similar grain plumpness, which is not quite as good as Schooner but superior to Gairdner - similar to Baudin. Flagship and Buloke will have to have their own segregations when delivered as malting.

If you have grain plumpness concerns then you should consider the Sloop types, which have superior grain plumpness to all other varieties. In the northern Mallee, you would probably stick to Sloop SA , which is quite early maturing; in the Wimmera and southern Mallee, Sloop Vic may be the better option.

Gairdner Plus is similar in maturity to Gairdner, but is CCN resistant and has improved spot form of net blotch resistance. Gairdner Plus has similar yield and level of grain plumpness to Gairdner. It will probably have to be segregated separate to Gairdner.

In Australia there has been a restructuring of barley breeding programs; it didn't make sense to have six state-based breeding programs when the market is struggling to accommodate the number of new varieties becoming available. The marketers only want to handle 2-3 varieties, at the most, for export, but producers want choice. It is hard to balance this but the end result is that the Horsham program will not continue in variety development but rather focus on providing the breeding programs in SA, WA and Queensland with novel germplasm to assist those programs meet the challenges of evolving pathogen resistances, changing markets and challenging climates and soils.

As an example of this type of activity, the Horsham program in recent years has put considerable effort into understanding the genetics of grain protein concentration in malting barleys so that varieties can be bred that are inherently lower in protein. Producers will need to manage "inherently low protein varieties" accordingly. You can manage protein upwards easier than you can manage protein down. Inherently low protein varieties would offer the grower the choice to include barley on parts of the crop rotation with higher fertility and hence higher yields without missing malting specifications because of excessively high protein. The trick is to ensure that these "low protein" varieties produce a minimum of 10 percent protein by growing them on the correct rotation, sowing them at the correct time, and using the correct nitrogen management. More work is needed to provide growers with the tools to make these decisions.

Quasar is a Barrett Burston Malting variety to replace Galaxy. Quasar and Buloke are growing in the WFS on-farm demonstrations this year. Quasar is a semi dwarf malting variety with superior malting characteristics to Gairdner. Quasar yields similarly to Gairdner, with a slightly larger grain. Quasar will grow in the same areas where Gairdner grows.

It is produced under contract with Barrett Burston, with a guaranteed minimum price and market price during harvest. Seed and contracts will be available for season 2006/7.

Quasar has similar disease resistance to Gairdner, and is probably better with leaf diseases.

The one thing that concerns us as advisors when swapping varieties is there is little agronomic data. The WFS on-farm demonstrations show how the variety will go in your paddock.

BCG can not always show the newest varieties available if they are unable to get the seed.

If you are looking primarily for stripe rust resistance to the WA strain and CCN resistance, you have probably been growing Mitre and Yitpi. CCN levels are low but they have not disappeared; we need to continue to grow these sorts of varieties because CCN is the biggest yield robber.

Clearfield JNZ and Stiletto; Clearfield is great technology if you have brome, but it is not the solution to everything. It is a good short-term solution. It does not have CCN resistance and is susceptible to the WA strain of stripe rust.

If you are growing non CCN resistant varieties in brome areas, you will run into huge problems. Brome grass carries the most eelworm of all the grasses, including wheats. Yitpi is CCN resistant and tolerant, but if you have brome, then it is not a true break.

Yitpi, Frame and Pugsley (because it is one of the most resistant to stripe rust) are good options if you are really concerned about spending money on fungicides. Drysdale has not yielded any more than other varieties in dry years, so Harm does not think it will be the solution. It is also not CCN resistant.

How do you change varieties and make the decision and be sure it is right? Are the new varieties better than what is here at the moment?

Sapphire (APW) is looking good. Ruby is possibly worth looking at. These two varieties need to do very well to beat Mitre and Yitpi; we need a 10-15 percent yield improvement and Harm does not think Sapphire or Ruby will do that.

Pastures: There is a new medic (Angel) that is tolerant to SU (sulphonyl urea) herbicides. This is a good option if you have livestock and you use SUs in your system.

The idea is not to use the SU herbicides in medic because that will increase the level of weeds with resistance to these herbicides – but you can sow these medics after using SU herbicides in your cereal crops without a significant penalty to pasture production.

You need to decide if the pasture phase if part of a cropping rotation (1-2 years) or is it going to be a 5-10 year thing.

Michael talked about the different pasture varieties growing in the trial and noted that not all are suited to this site. They will look to improve this next year.

Stripe rust is different this year to what it was last year. We are still seeing Yitpi carrying active levels of rust at the grain filling stage.

Firstly, choose a resistant variety. In the stripe rust indicator plots at Marnoo, H45 has no green leaf area left at all. Varieties also in the plots include (in order of increasing resistance): Krichauff (S), Mitre (MS-S), Annuello (MS), Yitpi (MR-MS), Ventura (MR) and Pugsley (R).

Pugsley and Ventura are the best we have got available commercially, in terms of stripe rust resistance. Note that Pugsley is moderately susceptible to susceptible (MS-S) to the other (VPM)strain of rust. And not every plant is resistant to the WA strain; 20-25 percent of plants will still carry rust.

If everyone grows Pugsley, we will have selected for the other strain of rust and introduce more problems.

Ventura is more resistant to the other strain, so it is less likely to be affected if the strain changes.

Most varieties in the pipeline rely on VPM resistance. If the WA strain mutates and can overcome the VPM strain, other varieties will be in trouble.

Secondly, use seed treatment (Jockey) or fertiliser treatment (Impact or Triad). Triad is the cheapest on fertiliser, but there are a few problems if it is used widespread because it is toxic and requires care when shifting fertiliser.

The treatments work well early but you can not rely on them to give protection throughout the year. Last year at the trial site, Impact and Jockey gave protection until later, but not this year.

Where Jockey alonehas been used on Yitpi, the bottom leaves are affected, as well as some of the flag leaf, which we do not want.

Seed treatments have a place but you can not rely on them to take you all the way through.

Thirdly, there are foliar fungicides. The key is timing – timing is critical. Last year near St Arnaud a paddock of Mitre was sprayed at GS39 (flag leaf emergence), but one corner of the paddock was not sprayed until 3 weeks later. The result was increased screenings from 3 to 8 percent and reduced yield by 0.5t/ha, which translates to $100/ha difference in gross margin.

The critical times are GS32 (especially if you have not used seed treatment) – this is when you need to be out monitoring. If you do not have time to monitor, use a seed treatment, then you only have to go out there by the time the flag leaf emerges.

It seems that adult plant resistance is not as effective this year as it has been late in other years, or is this due to environmental factors such as high rust pressure? As Yitpi is MR-MS (which used to be the minimum standard for growing a variety years ago), you would expect it will carry some rust.

You will need to consider the amount of crop damage when you are running over the crops treating with fungicide. Look at tramlining or GPS or consider mixing the fungicide with a herbicide to reduce the number of passes over the crop.

High nitrogen, high rust. Low nitrogen, low rust.

In untreated H45 in the stripe rust indicator plots, there are orange heads, the spores have got in when the glumes opened up during flowering. Often you do not see a reduction of stripe rust in the head after applying a fungicide because there is not muchtranslocation across the glumes. Where the H45 has been sprayed once at GS39, there is no rust in the head, the difference is quite amazing. The rust appears to be active again now, so the spray has worn off.

There was a discussion around later fungicide sprays being considered uneconomical.

Is it better to program in a fungicide spray (as in spraying for grey mould in lentils before canopy closure) anyway? If nine out of ten paddocks are clean, do we spray all to protect one? There are plenty of paddocks around that have had no rust control and are showing no signs of rust. We need to be vigilant and inspect paddocks and make the decision on an individual paddock basis.

Is there a chance of resistance to the fungicides? All of the rust control fungicides are Group C, but there have been no reported indications, worldwide, of rust overcoming fungicide applications.

In a Mitre crop that has flowered, there is active stripe rust on 20 percent of the flag leaf, while the rest of the flag leaf is deep green. It is tempting to spray for rust when you can see the crop has good potential, but even in more susceptible varieties, we still haven’t seen a response to fungicide after flowering (although we can not be certain that there would not be a response). Brooke said she would hold off in that situation.

Pugsley and Ventura (newer variety this year) are both APW. There is limited yield data, but they seem to be yielding quite well. Wait before changing over to these varieties.

If you sow earlier, do you need a higher rate of Impact? As the plant gets bigger, the fungicide gets more diluted in the plant. In winter, it can be one month before you see the rust after the spore has landed on the leaf, compared to ten days in these conditions.

In this trial, the computer simulation model, APSIM, is being used to look at a range of options to work out during the season what will give you the greatest return.

The high input treatment has cost $217 until now (not including harvest costs). A knockdown herbicide was used, urea was pre-drilled at 100kg/ha, and Yitpi was sown at 175 plants/m2. Granulock10Z was applied at 50kg/ha and Impact in furrow at 200ml/ha to the fertiliser. Urea was topdressed at 70kg/ha. Bumper was applied at GS39 (full flag leaf emergence) and the plot has been kept weed free. This is going over the top, and was the way it was done in the 80s and 90s. In the dry season of 1997, high input farming fell over and has been unsuccessful ever since.

The best bet treatment has cost $137 until now. This plot was cultivated, had a knockdown applied, Yitpi was sown at 175 plants/m2, N-Rich fertiliser was applied at 60kg/ha, it was topdressed with urea at 35kg/ha and Triad was applied at full flag leaf emergence. It will be interesting to see at the end of the year whether this plot yields more or less than the high input treatment.

The low input treatment has cost $76 so far. It was cultivated, had 10g Glean applied, sown at 120 plants/m2, and MAP was applied at 35kg/ha. No Impact was used, no fungicides for rust were applied, and it was not topdressed. Yield Prophet is predicting that this treatment will yield 1t/ha less than the first treatment – it will be interesting to see if this is the case.

The final two treatments are decided depending on how the season is looking. The best bet for a decile 2 season is the same as the best bet treatment, but every third row has been taken out of the crop, to see if the yield would be protected. Now that the season at Marnoo is a decile 4-5, rather than 2, it will be interesting to see how this plot yields.

The best bet for a decile 8 season has had a huge amount of urea applied (140kg/ha topdressed and N-Rich fertiliser at 60kg/ha). $197 has been spent to date. This treatment is very similar to the first treatment, but with a lot more nitrogen.

Click here to view the presentation given on the day by Stewart Rendell.