UK: New spring barley more attractive for farmers

Variety decisions have been made a little easier this year on one Bedfordshire grower’s farm after producing the best spring barley yields ever last season. Disappointed with growing Optic, Michael Banks of Waresley Farms, near Sandy switched his entire spring barley area to Westminster last year, Farming UK reported on January 22. This decision was based wholly on observations about the variety whilst on the HGCA Barley Crop Committee, a body responsible for selecting candidate varieties and deciding HGCA recommendations.

“I was impressed by its high hot water extract, good yield and large grain size. And I thought I should be involved with this variety as a grower,” says Mr Banks to Farming UK. “Westminster’s yield was a big jump from Optic, at 104% compared to 98% on the Recommended List, and furthermore Optic tended to brackle and we were losing a lot of grain.”

Mr Banks was delighted when the 40ha came to be harvested. “It averaged the best yields from a spring barley that we’ve ever had on the farm at about 7.5t/ha.”

Specific weight averaged 68kg/hl and with 93.75% retained over a 2.5mm sieve. Nitrogen was slightly higher than expected: “I would like to look at its nitrogen retention again, but am bearing in mind that last year a lot of barley nitrogen was on the high side,” says Mr Banks. In addition the variety was not unduly tall, and did not brackle.

Mr Banks believes the success with Westminster is due in part to the variety’s excellent disease resistance. It was definitely cleaner than other spring barleys, according to Mr Banks’ agronomist, Andrew Havergal of Frontier. With no previous experience with the variety Mr Havergal believes the fungicide input adopted last season may have been excessive, and this season he proposes to reduce the rates with a view to spending around £30/ha, a saving of £10/ha on last season.