In Canterbury, autumn sown feed and biscuit wheat yields of 10.5 t/ha were down on the four year average of 11 t/ha. However, some trial sites have performed better, with feed and biscuit wheat yields above the long term average at the Methven and St Andrews trial sites. There was high Septoria tritici blotch and lodging pressure at the Temuka site. Cultivars with resistance, including Torch, PRL954 and Empress, did relatively better at this site. The top feed wheat performers were Torch, at 11.3 t/ha average over the six sites, followed by Wakanui and KWW46.
This season biscuit wheat cultivars Claire and Empress yielded on average similarly at 10.5 t/ha and 10.6 t/ha respectively, although Empress is ahead over four seasons by 0.6 t/ha. New biscuit wheat cultivar KWW47 also yielded 10.5 t/ha. Autumn sown milling wheat averaged 8.7 t/ha which was below the 9.3 t/ha average over the last four years. New variety KWM31 was the top yielding milling wheat.
Autumn sown barley yields of 9.1 t/ha were the same as the Canterbury four year average. The barley cultivars of Sanette and SYN411-285 topped the trials at the Rakaia and St Andrews sites.
For the second season, an additional replicate not sprayed with fungicide has been included at the Chertsey, Methven and Temuka feed and biscuit wheat sites. Assessments from these unsprayed plots contribute to Crop Action in giving an indication of what diseases are active through the season. Another way to show a cultivar’s disease resistance is by comparing unsprayed and sprayed yields. The greater the yield drop without fungicide, the more susceptible a cultivar is to disease.
Assessment of the yield potential of early drilled wheat continued for the fourth season. There was an average yield advantage of 0.83 t/ha to March drilled feed wheat trials compared with April on dryland at the FAR Chertsey Arable Site over the last four seasons. The largest yield advantage was 1.9 t/ha for March drilled wheat in 2012-13. However, irrigated crops at Chertsey showed a yield benefit from early drilling in only two of the last four seasons.