At the recent Finley Discussion Group meetings at Blighty and Berrigan we discovered winter crop soils had lost moisture and many farmers were using off-quota water either from MIL or West Corurgan to water wheat, canola and barley.
Most farmers received 60mm in August and expected the soil moisture to be better.
Wheat and barley is at the moisture-sensitive boot and flowering stage, and canola is still at a sensitive moisture stage after 6-8 weeks flowering, losing flowers to 5-25 per cent but needing soil moisture for good pod and seed set and oil percentage.
The rule of thumb for good soil moisture is 25 days after 1-5 per cent flowering.
There appears to be a bigger range of canola varieties being used with 6-9 weeks' flowering, some shorter height and maturity.
The ideal moist, warm soils in early April were the start of canola sowing and it kept going to the end month.
If there is a poor finish farmers thought barley would yield two tonne higher than wheat making up for the drop in price.
At Blighty an April 20 watered-up PY 421C canola crop with the Blighty group still had 100cm of 100 per cent soil moisture.
Recent showers helped out. After eight weeks’ flowering, the flowering was less than 30 per cent.
A dryland Sunmaster wheat that emerged on May 15 had 40cm of no ball, crumbly soil equal to 25-50 per cent soil moisture.
The 50-75cm layer was crumbly, rated 25 per cent soil moisture. The crop was at the most moisture-sensitive heads-out stage and close to flowering. There were 3.5 green leaves. Temperatures need to stay under 25ºC to allow this crop to fill or receive 25-30mm.
A dryland Neo barley crop that was to be sprayed with Prosaro® for scald and alphacypermethrin for armyworms was at the 10 per cent headed AWNS stage.
It’s a heavy 100 per cent ground cover biomass crop. The soil had poor soil moisture and at 30cm depth crumble ball 25-50 per cent moisture, 50cm ball 50 per cent moisture, 60cm crumbly ball 25-50 per cent moisture.
Watered up faba beans were still flowering and re-treated with Miradistar for choc spot and Trojan® insects. The auger moisture at 100cm was easily balling and ribbon 3mm or 100 per cent available moisture.
The FY428 irrigated watered up canola with three flowers left per branch augered 95cm ball and ribbon 100 per cent soil moisture.
The Berrigan-Tocumwal farmer group inspected an irrigated Neo barley crop out in head and fully awned with 8t/ha potential. It had a lot of smut. The top 0-50cm soil balled giving 50 per cent available moisture. From 60cm on the soil would not ball, just fragments rated at 25-50 per cent moisture. The crop needed moisture and an irrigation had started. Hopes were high that the Neo would not lodge.
An irrigated canola crop with 15 per cent flowers left balled soil to 50cm, 60-70cm ball and ribbon -100 per cent soil moisture then crumble 25 per cent moisture to 100cm. It was a toss-up on watering given the pods were only at the green seed stage.
A couple of farmers were using Schedule IT to make irrigation decisions, and a canola crop had received four 15mm spray irrigations.
The dryland Shotgun wheat was out in head with 300 tillers. For 10-50cm the soil balled up 50 per cent moisture, 50-60cm ball and ribbon 100 per cent moisture, then dried and crumbled back to 85cm. It will finish.
The discussion group meetings have finished for the season as farmers start planning for harvest and storage and marketing. After harvest Cropcheck, crop records will be updated and crops benchmarked by yield for booklet results presentation. It’s always interesting finding out which factors or checks gave highest yields or lowest yields.
The season so far has had average to above-average rainfall and the relatively mild temperatures have resulted in a good to great potential season. We are heading for a big harvest. Dryland wheat potential is 3-5t/ha, barley 4-7t/ha and canola 2-3.5t/ha. Irrigated wheat 5-9t/ha, barley 5-8t/ha and canola 3-4.5t/ha.
The rider is that we would like another 25mm to finish off dryland crops and for temperatures to remain mild below 28ºC.
15°C