CROPS WATCH: Front loading winter barley for the season ahead

Front loading winter barley sets it up for the season, according to TerraChem agronomist John Mulhare, who kicked off the first installment of CROPS WATCH in association with TerraChem this season.

“I’m a believer in a big first fungicide, because if you get it right at the start you’re cruising the whole way through the season,” John explained.

The dry start to 2019 was followed by a wet few weeks in early March. This led to a stressful time for crops and resulted in yellowing on the leaves of winter barley.

John began to provide support for his winter barley in late February and applied plenty of nutrients in the form of Uplift, Cereal Aloy and Boron (15%).

Uplift helps to reduces stress, contributes to grain site formation and hence maximise yield potential. In the video above John points out how applying these products has reduced stress.

Yellow patches, which appeared in areas of the field where beet was loaded and drawn in October 2017, have recovered following application of these nutrients.

Looking at the crop’s growth stage in the video John decided to continue on with a robust agronomy programme and applied a strong T1 fungicide the day after filming (March 22).

This included Treoris, Rubric (epoxiconazole – which has a higher rating than prothioconazole on brown rust) and a new mildewcide – Midas.

Growth regulator was applied at this time as the crop was at GS31 on the day of filming and nutrients were also included to reduce crop stress.

John applied his T1 on March 22 (GS 31):

Treoris – 2L/ha;
Rubric – 0.75L/ha;
Midas – 0.25L/ha;
Moddus – 0.2L/ha;
CeCeCe – 1L/ha;
Uplift – 5L/ha;
SulfaMag – 1L/ha.

Mildew was present on this crop of Bazooka winter barley

Background to the crop

The crop of Bazooka winter barley was sown on October 2 at a rate of 200 seeds/m² (Redigo Deter dressed) into winter wheat stubbles, which were disced twice and drilled with a disc drill. Prior to discing farmyard manure was applied at a rate of 10t/ha.

Firebird was applied at 0.3L/ha in the winter. The next time the sprayer visited the field was February 23.

On this occasion the crop received K2 at 2L/ha; Uplift at 3L/ha; Cereal Aloy at 1L/ha; Boron (15%) at 1L/ha; Cameo Max SX at 45g/ha; and Kinvara at 2L/ha.

Fertiliser

So far this crop of hybrid winter barley has received 125kg/ha of nitrogen (N) and 20kg/ha of sulphur (S) in the form of UAN (urea and ammonium nitrate in water) and ammonium sulphate.