Arable News

Climate variability has already played a key part this season – from mid-September to the end of the year exceptional rainfall brought the misery of floods and a virtual complete halt to winter wheat drilling for many.

In a normal season, spring weed control is a case of mopping up odd weeds that have come through a hefty autumn stack of residual herbicides. But 2019 wasn’t a normal year, with the autumn cereals that did get planted often receiving less residual herbicides than usual, and what was applied has been under deluge from the winter rain, making it vital that growers have an effective weed control plan for early spring.

Farmers growing winter oilseed rape will have a new broad-leaf weed herbicide at their disposal this spring in the form of Korvetto from Corteva Agriscience.

Crop production specialists Hutchinsons are offering growers the opportunity to defer payment on seed purchased before 31 March 2020 for leading oilseed rape varieties LG Aurelia and Acacia.

Sowing green manure seed mix on uncropped arable headlands, left where growers just managed to muddle in landwork in the autumn, could help to restore soil structure and build fertility, and play an important role as an ecological asset.

Following the unmitigated wash-out of Autumn 2019 and the elevated importance of spring sown crops this year, ADAMA Agricultural Solutions UK has launched its latest online crop protection portal to help growers tackle the twin challenges of cereal disease control and how to manage the increased area of spring plantings.

Experts are warning potato growers and buyers not to apply Chlorpropham (CIPC) at 2020 store loading, as they will face a high risk of not being able to sell the crop.

AHDB has launched a suite of new resources including tools, videos, web pages and publications, in a bid to strengthen its cereal disease management guidance for 2020.

Field-scale, heavy land trials at Agrii’s Stow Longa technology centre last season revealed spring barley yield and gross margin differences of almost 3t/ha and well over £350/ha.

UK spring barley may be facing a big harvest in 2020, if more of it is grown due to difficulties planting winter cereals, but there are opportunities for the crop. That was the message from a malting barley conference held in Newmarket, Suffolk, recently.

Potato growers are being urged to prepare now for changes in the potato seed treatment line-up this spring, as product choices and application options have narrowed.

Recognising the difficult planting conditions last autumn, Syngenta is offering UK growers free germination testing of undrilled 2019 seed of its hybrid winter barley varieties that are having to be carried over for planting in autumn 2020.