Spring field events booklet

The Autumn Cereal Cultivar Evaluation Book for 2024/25 is now available to read.

With Spark and One NZ decommissioning their 2G and 3G networks across the country near the end of 2025. FAR has contacted the companies involved with the moisture probe trial to find out how it could affect your farm.

Planting a crop consisting of multiple cereal cultivars (cultivar mixtures) enhances genetic diversity, which can improve both seasonal and long-term agronomic performance and slow or reduce disease spread. To assess the viability of this approach for feed wheat production under current commercial conditions in New Zealand, FAR conducted a series of field trials in Chertsey, Mid Canterbury, between 2021 and 2024.

This FAR Focus outlines the key practices required to grow cocksfoot seed crops, covering topics such as crop establishment, nutrient requirements, crop management and harvesting. Topics outside the scope of this booklet include emissions profiles and off-farm considerations such as seed cleaning etc.

Watch the recording for a webinar with FAR Senior Field Officer Ben Harvey on managing herbicide resistance pre-autumn sowing, covering what is herbicide resistance and methods to reduce the risk of herbicide resistance.

Read the booklet for the 2025 autumn round up series here. 

This arable extra discusses trial results from the 2024 herbicide screening trial at Kowhai Farm in Lincoln, Canterbury. 

Harvest Snippets provides a harvest season summary. Find all the 2024/2025 season harvest snippets here.

This update outlines the results of five years of trials exploring pre-desiccant options for managing bulky white clover crops, aiming to reduce rapid leaf regrowth following diquat desiccation under wet or high-fertility conditions. Achieving effective desiccation required balancing this process with post-harvest regrowth, as clover seed crops are often used for lamb grazing on New Zealand cropping farms.

Part 2 of the 2024 Cereal Disease Management Strategy provides an overview of the research behind the development of this strategy. It’s the ‘extra for experts’ part, providing in-depth information that will help you to understand how and why to prioritise your fungicide spend.