The 2022 Irish cereal harvest is well underway at this stage with most winter barley crops combined and in store.
Small acreages of oats and oilseed rape have also been harvested at this stage.
Yields, so far, seem to be varied across the country, particularly where barley is concerned. But other crops seem to be performing that little bit better.
Teagasc’s Conor Kavanagh is confirming that winter barley crops in Tipperary are yielding between 2.0t and 4.8t/ac.
“Yields are quite variable, which seems to be the trend right across the country,” he said.
“The earliest-sown and earliest harvested crops have been the lowest yielding up to this point.
Barley and straw yields
According to Kavanagh, there was a lot of barley crops planted out during the last week of September and first week of October, many of which have yielded quite poorly come harvest.
“Bushel weights in these crops tend to be quite low as well,” he further explained.
“Later-sown barleys yielded better with higher bushel weights.
“At this stage up to 90% of the winter barley acreage has been in south Tipperary. The figure drops to between 70% and 80% in the north of the county.”
Cereal growers are confirming a drop-off in straw yields across the board this year.
“In previous years, farmers would have been baling up to 16 4×4 round bales per acre.
“In 2022, this figure has fallen back to 12; a reduction of around 25%,” Kavanagh confirmed.
Harvest in south-east
Teagasc is confirming a similar story in the south-east. Wexford-based tillage specialist John Pettit explained: “I have never seen barley yields as variable as is the case at the present time.
“Growers are securing yields in the range 1.8-4.7t/ac. But the bulk of the crops are coming in between 3.0 and 3.5t.”
According to Pettit, growers are also seeing a tremendous variation in bushel weights.
“Straw yields are tracking grain yields, for the most part. Growers are confirming some very poor straw yields. But in some cases yields of straw have been excellent,” he said.
Kavanagh indicated that the variation in yield now being recorded had not come as a complete surprise.
“There had been a lot of barley yellow dwarf virus [BYDV] aphid activity in crops coming out of the winter,” he commented.
“In addition, winter crops that had been grown as part of a continuous barley rotation seemed to come in that little bit earlier and with lighter yields.
“These results verify the benefits of growers implementing effective crop rotation policies,” he explained.