Is Wakanui’s reign starting to wane?

“Wakanui’s still there after seven years now but some varieties are starting to equal it,” FAR’s Rob Criagie told the Timaru meeting.

Torch and Starfire (previously coded as KWW46) are on par with it off FAR’s four irrigated sites in Canterbury with Gator and Conqueror also in the running of the three dryland trials.

Craigie said a point to note with Torch is a change to its leaf rust resistance rating, which has gone from resistant to moderately susceptible. “We think there’s a new strain of leaf rust around that can affect Torch.”

For biscuit wheat growers Empress and Inferno are the leaders leaving long-standing reference cultivar Claire for dust. “Claire’s not really in the race anymore yield wise.”

Craigie highlighted Inferno’s performance off dryland, where it matches Empress, but irrigated it trails by 3%.

Moving up the quality scale into gristing milling wheat, Hanson is “about 5% ahead of Raffles, so that’s quite a handy yield advantage and it’s quite resistant to disease.”

In the medium grade millers, Discovery is “yielding particularly well” though it is in only its second year of CPT, and its high yield does appear to be diluting protein content.

Among the premium millers “Conquest is fading away yield-wise,” added Craigie. 

“Reliance and Duchess are yielding substantially more.”

Among the autumn-sown barleys Sannette remains the standout, though three coded cultivars from the same stable as Sannette, but with only one or two years results, are now on a par. “They’re all four-five percent ahead of the rest.”

FAR’S autumn cultivar evaluation booklets with detailed disease and yield data for all varieties in the CPT trials will be available later this month, Craigie said.