It has been confirmed that Ambition and Prospect remain the two fully recommended forage maize varieties in Ireland for 2025.

Significantly, they are also the control varieties used by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) to create the official listings.

A total of 20 maize varietal options have been assessed by DAFM to create this year’s list. Of these, two are fully recommended with another four receiving a provisional recommendation. These are - Resolute; KWS Anastasio; Saxon; and P7179.

Skewing the significance of the forage maize recommendations is the fact that the significant bulk of the trial results are generated from uncovered plots.

In contrast, 75% of commercial maize crops grown in Ireland are planted out under plastic mulch.

DAFM highlights this very issue in its explanatory booklet within which the recently published recommended listing is contained.

However, reference is also made to the fact that covered trials recommenced in 2023 with the availability of a mulch film compliant with the Single Use Plastics Directive.

The reference indicators generated courtesy of the control varieties is as follows: dry matter yield - 18.1t/ha; starch content - 27.4%; dry matter content - 40.5%.

Relative yields are used to show differences between maize varieties with the average of the control varieties set at 100.

Whole-crop samples from each trial plot are taken at harvest to determine the dry matter content. Dried samples are analysed by FBA Laboratories Ltd., Cappoquin, Co. Waterford and Eurofins Laboratories in Scotland to determine starch content.

Starch content is an important indicator of the feeding value of the variety. It is expressed as a percentage of dry matter and is determined by wet chemistry. Relative starch contents are used to show differences between varieties with the average of the control varieties set at 100.

Dry matter content is a good indicator of the maturity of the variety at harvest. Relative harvest dry matter contents are used to show the differences between varieties with the average of the control varieties set at 100.

Ambition is a good yielding variety with good dry matter and good starch content, and is medium maturing.

Prospect is a good yielding varietal option with good starch content. The dry matter content is also good, while Prospect is a medium maturing maize variety.  

However, all of these trends could change totally once trial results from plots established under plastic mulch are factored into DAFM’s number crunching.