Seedtech showed off the latest varieties on its books last Wednesday, July 3. The company known for hybrid barley gave the attendance a few varieties to look out for. Some will be no strangers to tillage farmers as they have been in trial in recent years.

Bazooka and Belfry will take up 26% of the winter barley seed next season. Belfry is the bigger of the two on 15%.

The grain quality of hybrid barley has improved in recent years. Seedtech’s technical director Tim O’Donovan pointed out some of the reasons why this is the case.

“Using plant breeding to solve problems is as old as farming but it is increasingly more important as we lose old reliable sprays.

“We have seen a step-change improvement in our hybrid-barley varieties – Belfry and Bazooka.”

He added that these varieties have an “outstanding” disease profile with stronger straw.

Winter wheat

AgriLand has reported on Graham from the wheat plots before and it looked as impressive at Seedtech’s open day. It scored 105 for relative yield on the recommended list trials last year.

“We are very proud to be able to introduce a reliable winter wheat, like Graham, in a time of huge change for winter wheat growers.”

KWS Extase is a variety coming along the line with high resistance to septoria and can be seen in the image below.

Spring barley

SY Arderin and SY Errigal were the stand outs in the spring barley plots. SY Errigal is a malting variety with a score of 8 for both mildew and net blotch.

SY Errigal and SY Arderin had relative yield ratings of 108 and 109, respectively in 2017. This figure dropped in 2018 amidst the summer’s drought.