Drought has not slowed the continuing quest for new and improved wheat varieties with 1600 nursery lines at Biloela currently under going agronomic evaluation, quality testing and disease screening.

Queensland Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries principal plant breeder Dr Phillip Banks and experimentalist Douglas Lush with the wheat breeding team at Toowoomba’s Leslie Research Centre have identified a number of extremely promising future wheat lines this year.

Dr Banks said seed from selected wheat lines evaluated under supplementary irrigation at Biloela Research Station would be planted out next winter for further assessment based on-farm yield trials from Liverpool Plains through to Central Queensland.

Working with the wheat improvement team’s Biloela-based principal technical officer Peter Keys and cooperating farmers, Dr Banks said they intended to plant four on-farm 5ha yield trials within the Central Highlands and Callide-Dawson next winter.

“Our plant breeding objective is to always be well positioned to release high performance wheat lines when growers are fortunate enough to get a seasonal break,” Dr Banks said.

That preparedness had enabled the DPI&F in collaboration with Enterprise Grains Australia (EGA) to develop the three new varieties EGA Gregory, EGA Wylie and EGA Wentworth.

All three varieties released on October 5 by the Minister for Primary Industries Henry Palaszczuk have been in the plant breeding production line for 12 years and specifically targeted for regional field trials since 1999.

Dr Banks said EGA Gregory, a slower maturity Australian Prime Hard (APH) classification wheat and EGA Wylie, an intermediate maturity Australian Hard (AH) wheat, were both ideally suited to Central Queensland’s growing conditions.

“EGA Gregory, which fits the Central region’s April planting window, has excellent baking qualities and noodle sheet colour that will make it an in-demand product on our domestic and international markets,” Dr Banks said.

“EGA Wylie is expected to replace the existing commercial Baxter variety wheat as it has disease resistance advantages while its lower height makes it more lodging resistant.”

Dr Banks said that given the current smaller market price premium offered for APH lines at a minimum 13 per cent protein, growers were now more inclined to target higher yielding AH wheats to maximise their returns.   

Pacific Seeds successfully tendered for the licence to market the three new varieties to national and international markets. The company was planning extensive field demonstration and seed expansion plantings for the 2005 season with a full commercial seed release in 2006.