GrainSearch Wheat & Barley Evaluation Trials – Oct 2020Harvest Declaration Form

October 9, 2020

Recently GrainSearch recorded a video with Southern Farming Systems (SFS) to highlight the current trials we have located at their main trial site at Inverleigh, Victoria.

The video below shows some of the steps that we take along the variety development pathway – from hand sowing 5g-20g of seed we receive straight from Quarantine, through to the selection and seed multiplication of our next hopeful wheat and/or barley variety.

As noted, GrainSearch full utilises the End Point Royalties it receives from its current commercial varieties; Manning, Revenue and Beaufort (Wheats) and Westminster (Barley) – in our quest to find the next varieties to bring to market.   Under-declaring of harvest production – hence lower EPR’s collected – does impact on our ability to keep exploring new sources of genetics to bring to market.

Our latest developments

  • We now await the ongoing successful evaluation of Bottler within Barley Australia’s Malt Accreditation Program (final outcome due Feb 2022) and
  • We are very excited to have two Seed Affiliates on board with our Feed Barley variety – Nitro. Both affiliates are growing a batch of commercial seed this season in preparation for seed sales in the 2021 sowing season
    • AMPS (Tamworth NSW) – Nitro has proven itself to be one of the best barley varieties suited to the Liverpool Plains growing region over several seasons of testing by AMPS.
    • Midland Seeds (Tasmania) – Nitro showed strong promise as an alternate variety to RGT Planet in Tasmania in the 2019 SFS Variety Management trials.

Just around the corner

Barley

In the video, GrainSearch mentions the new potential barley line GSP-17-27-B – which is undergoing small scale seed increase in preparation for wider testing in 2020 and potential entry into the Malt Accreditation Program.  The line is robust – showing strong results in the dry finish of 2017 at Rupanyup and has a nice malt profile (micro malting).   If plans run smoothly, this line could be named and commercially available for the 2025 sowing season.

Wheat

Based on trial results from this harvest, GrainSearch will begin to select key new wheat lines to begin final commercial evaluation trials.  Our aim is to build on our highly successful feed wheat platform and bring growers varieties with strong yield potential with a matching strong disease tolerance profile.

GrainSearch/SPS is a Signature Partner with SFS and is proud to support this vital grower group