They’re taking no risks with the commercial release of two new, more disease resistant  chickpea varieties for northern New South Wales, with plans for top growers to try them next year and have those first crops benchmarked.

The full commercial release of the as yet unnamed new varieties is planned for 2006, and is to be accompanied by variety specific agronomy packages developed by the industry. .

“They”  are the New South Wales Department of Primary Industries (NSWDPI), whose chickpea breeder, Ted Knights, is responsible for the two varieties, AWB Seeds, which will handle commercial seed production and distribution, and Pulse Australia, which coordinates the agronomy packages.

The new varieties – developed in the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) supported national chickpea breeding program – are area specific.

The chickpea line 9113-13N-2 will suit areas of northern NSW west of the Newell Highway, where the pressure from Ascochyta blight is not so great but phytophthora root rot can be a more serious problem.

The second line, 93011-1021, is better adapted to areas east of the Newell Highway, where the relative importance of the two diseases reverses.

Mr Knights says no chickpea varieties had Ascochyta blight resistance when the disease first appeared in the northern grains region in 1998, and the outbreak meant that much of the northern region’s pre-release chickpea genetic material  was almost  obsolete.

But, while the two varieties released since then – Howzat and Jimbour – remained  susceptible to the disease, management strategies developed by the industry and Pulse Australia allowed growers to manage Ascochyta in them.

The management packages called for an intensive fungicide spray regime and the cost of this, on top of widespread drought, had seen a number of growers become dissatisfied with chickpeas as a rotational crop. The obvious answer was new varieties with improved disease resistance.

Growers and advisers attending NSWDPI field days at Narrabri and Tamworth  last week saw plots of the two new varieties as well as other lines being developed in the breeding program.

The new varieties had been sown over five sowing dates and at two sowing depths, as well as in the Tamworth Agriculture Institute’s Ascochyta and phytopthora “nurseries” ,  which allow them to be tested under purposely manufactured disease situations.