As thoughts turn to spring cropping, there are a host of new varieties available for drilling this spring offering better yields and disease resistance.

However, for some markets, the old favourites such as Laureate spring barley and Lynx spring beans will remain popular. 

Here, David Bouch, Hutchinsons’ national seeds manager, gives his views on spring cropping variety choices for this spring.

See also: How low-input spring cereals SFI action may fit this spring

Barley

Laureate remains the undoubted number one in the spring barley marketplace, outselling its competitors while offering dual-purpose end markets. Diablo occupies a similar market position but is not as widely grown.

David believes Planet will slip further as the newer options gain a greater share of the market.

However, it will still have support from growers who have seen very consistent performance over the years.

Skyway offers brewing ability and is fully approved, as now is Tennyson, which is more akin to Laureate with its dual-purpose credentials.

Several varieties are under test for malting quality, including Aquarius, Nos Gambit, Belter, Nos Munron and Olsen.

Feed varieties Westminster and Kelim still sell well for this market, but arguably the malting varieties offer better yield.

Wheat

In the spring wheat sector, Mulika, Harsum and Ladum are the Group 1 offer, with the former now under a significant yield disadvantage (94%) compared with the much newer options.

Ladum has no major disease weaknesses, with high resistance to mildew, brown rust and Septoria tritici, meaning it will be a major consideration for next spring.

However, David adds that Harsum has the advantage of having orange wheat blossom midge resistance.

Cochise and to a lesser extent Chilham provide alternatives in the Group 2 sector, which is little changed, while Alicium has the best yield at 104%.

In the Group 4 category, Escape has the largest market share with Fixum since its arrival within the sector. Fixum is a relatively late-maturing variety, which will be a limitation to some.

Again, it appears that Fixum has no major disease weaknesses, with high resistance to yellow rust, mildew and brown rust. 

Oats

Spring oat Isabel is the market leader, with Merlin making significant headway. Canyon still has support within the marketplace.

Essentially, the key to growing spring oats is rainfall in June and timeliness of harvest. Conway is an early maturing option.

Asterion, newly added to the Recommended List last autumn, has high untreated yields with good resistance to mildew.

The end market will dictate the preferred variety in almost all the spring quality cereals.

Pulses

Spring beans will again be dominated by Lynx, while Yukon has the best mildew resistance and is the earliest maturing.

New options for this spring include Navara and Hawk. Synergy is a new low-vicine and low-convicine (LVC) variety and is higher yielding than the other two LVC varieties, Futura and Victus.

© Gary Naylor Photography

As far as peas are concerned, it will be Concerto (118%) and Batist (116%) for high-yielding yellow peas.

With blue peas, David highlights three from the NPZ portfolio: Carrington offers a good yield of 107% and Bluetime (103%) will again be popular, and there is the newer option Butterfly.

For white peas, Kameleon from Senova and NPZ’s Orchestra are the standout options. However, David says seed availability is key.

A new pink pea category has been created for the Descriptive List to accommodate the new variety Flamingo from Cope Seeds & Grain.

In the latest Descriptive List, it yielded 87%, with specific end markets from human consumption to bird and pet feed.

Vision is a recent addition to the list for marrowfats with the best downy mildew rating of 7 and a yield of 99%, whilst Sakura has shown its consistency and support from the end user.

The yield gap is nearly 20%, but again, as with anything that involves a quality premium, the outcome will be decided by the end user.

Finally, while David concludes that key varieties will sell out, as it stands the market itself probably will not.