Ireland - Seedtech's hybrid barley proves its worth to growers
Ireland
August 31, 2018
As the harvest draws to a close for another year, Seedtech, which distributes hybrid barley in Ireland, visited three tillage farmers to see how the crop performed on their farms and to learn what their plans are for the coming year.
Now an established crop, hybrid barley has proven its strength in the field across yield, straw quality, disease resistance and more recently in grain quality.
The latest 2018 winter barley trial results from the Department of Agriculture put all three hybrid barley varieties (Quadra, Bazooka and Belfry) ahead of all conventional two-row varieties on yield.
This, coupled with a very strong harvest performance in the field, shows hybrid barley has proven itself to be the smart choice for growers.
Farmers’ Views
Speaking about hybrid barley across a number of different topics were Tim Ronaldson, farming in Ballymore Eustace, Co. Kildare; John O’Byrne in Tullow Co. Carlow; and Gary Prendergast, Golden, Co. Tipperary.
In this article we take a sneak peak at what each grower had to say.
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Discussing 2018 Hybrid Barley Harvest Performance
Gary Prendergast, a well-known contractor in Co. Tipperary, farms with his father Tommy. Up until two years ago they had grown all conventional winter barley, but decided to try Quadra hybrid barley when they saw the yield potential it had.
That decision has paid off for them; explaining this year’s harvest result Gary said: “We were happy with the yield from hybrids, they yielded 0.5t to 0.75t more than the two-rows; with Quadra yielding 4.2t/ac and the two-rows yielding between 3.3t/ac and 3.6t/ac.”
"We had 10-12 round bales/ac on the two-rows and 12-14 round bales from Quadra hybrid barley."
As a result of this year’s successful harvest, Gary and Tommy plan to increase their hybrid barley to 50% of their winter barley acreage.
John O’Byrne, who has been growing hybrid barley for the last seven years, grew Quadra, Bazooka and Belfry hybrid barley this year. One particular field yielded 3.9 t/ac at 63KPH, which was in a second winter barley slot after oats; with higher yield figures recorded in other fields.
John believes that hybrid barley has really proven its reliable performance in the last few years and plans to sow 75% of his winter barley area in hybrid barley for the coming year.
“We’ve grown hybrid barley in very wet years and now in a drought situation and it still performed very well. It’s proven itself to me that we can get the yield year-on-year.”
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