Spring wheat varietal drought tolerance

[workboots]

This seems like a decent year to showcase spring wheat drought tolerance. Anyone else seeing more or less tolerance with one or another ?

We are looking at nearly 6 bu/ac less on our redberry vs viewfield.

Regarding bushel weight Redberry 63lb per bu
Viewfield 66lb per bu

Wheatland and Starbuck are next on the chopping block with a same field comparison of the viewfield.

Also hearing results of lower yields with the brandon wheat. We didn’t have any brandon so I can’t personally speak to that.

[WiltonRanch]

This seems like a decent year to showcase spring wheat drought tolerance. Anyone else seeing more or less tolerance with one or another ?

We are looking at nearly 6 bu/ac less on our redberry vs viewfield.

Regarding bushel weight Redberry 63lb per bu
Viewfield 66lb per bu

Wheatland and Starbuck are next on the chopping block with a same field comparison of the viewfield.

Also hearing results of lower yields with the brandon wheat. We didn’t have any brandon so I can’t personally speak to that.

No one in the immediate area has tied into wheat but from the look of things my short maturity splendour looks poor compared to neighbours Brandon. Neighbour has Brandon and Viewfield side by side and he thinks Brandon looks better. Another neighbour has Viewfield and it looks great. I’ve used splendour for quite a while and it has served me well but it has consistently been 10 bu behind neighbours Brandon. Though splendour through these cold wet years has meant earlier harvest and good quality where others had issues.

[workboots]

If you can store wheat around here, you can almost always negotiate a #2 at some point in the year regardless of quality. You think In the long run the quality drags your revenue down more then the 10bu?

[agstar77]

Our starbuck came through the drought well. Sample looks good. Waiting for results from CGC.

[SASKFARMER]

Alida I’m not that happy with but Starbucks seems to have come through nice.

[poorboy]

Be sure to think about your moisture situation vs variety. Early season moisture and then zero rain tends to favor early maturing wheat. Moisture stress early and then rain tends to favor a later wheat like Viewfield. Usually stage of the crop in relation to rainfall is the difference and not variety. Same for ergot, flower at the wrong time and you have ergot.

[Sheepwheat]

Be sure to think about your moisture situation vs variety. Early season moisture and then zero rain tends to favor early maturing wheat. Moisture stress early and then rain tends to favor a later wheat like Viewfield. Usually stage of the crop in relation to rainfall is the difference and not variety. Same for ergot, flower at the wrong time and you have ergot.

Also, the way the year has been, unless you had your different wheat varieties seeded the same day, in thirty foot strips on all your wheat land, getting an accurate feel for comparison is impossible.

A field adjacent is not even good enough in my view. The way rain hit, the preceding crop, snowfall and drifts, way too many factors to make assumptions imho.

[workboots]

The first year we introduced viewfield it was alongside our flagship brandon wheat. It turned out to be a dry july, viewfield outperformed. We dropped the brandon that year in favour of the viewfield for its drought tolerance.


I agree the rain timing is a factor but when you move from one variety of wheat to another, in the same field and the monitor jumps significantly and then maintains that lead, you can most likely attribute this to genetics.

[poorboy]

I agree the rain timing is a factor but when you move from one variety of wheat to another, in the same field and the monitor jumps significantly and then maintains that lead, you can most likely attribute this to genetics.

I think that statement is pure crap. It might work some years in a very even growing season, but generally I totally disagree.

For example,
I had an early and late variety in the same field, early frost the first year I had the trial and the late variety sucked on yield. Next year I had the same varieties and a late season rain. The later variety filled up nice and plump (yielded like crazy) while the early variety was all shriveled up and did not benefit from the rain. So if I had only done the trial once, it would have given 2 different answers depending on the year.

Side by side trials are only meaningful in my opinion if done on your own farm, with your own seeding rate and fertilizer rate and ONLY carefully looked at in years that are normal for your farm. No use looking at ultra late varieties on the year your farm doesn't get frost until Oct when your normal frost date is the first week of Sept, for example.

[workboots]

I make sure 3rd party trial data aligns with what I’m seeing. Most of the time the potential is already known before it makes a visit to the operation for first hand experience. No question that each year brings different results, but one should play by law of averages if the ultimate goal is to drive farm revenue. If your region can’t support a late wheat then you obviously shouldn’t grow it. Stick with the early maturity (and on average) lower yielding.

A fellow that’s been in this game a long time once told me “ just when you think you’ve got this farming racket figured out, Mother Nature will throw you a curve ball “

In 2020 our veiwfield was around 5 bu below the average due to a bacterial blight issue or something of the sort. Fortunately this year it wasn’t an issue and it again has proven to be a strong competitor.

[furrowtickler]

Viewfield amd Wheatland held in there decent considering

[furrowtickler]

Foray CPSR is a dog in drought

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Slightly off topic, but relating to needing to test a new variety in all conditions.

We grew Sundre barley for the first time in 2009, in a very hot dry year, almost 2002 type of dry around here. It grew incredible in those conditions, only complaint was it lodged very badly. Well over 100 bushels per acre, and 6 bales of straw per acre, with no rain and excess heat. Most other barley locally was just pitiful, a fraction of that literally. Everyone was admiring our barley and needing to know what variety it was, wanting to grow it themselves.

The next year was back to normal, excess rain, cool, constantly wet. Turns out this variety is extremely susceptible to leaf diseases. As in leaves consumed and turning brown before even flag leaf, long before proper fungicide timing. Result was light bushel weight, very poor yield.

Same results by others who grew it.

Tried it a few more times, with multiple fungicide applications, but in an average wet year, it was a disaster.

Just hit it just right by growing it the first time in a drought.