THE 2011 National Variety Trials in South Australia were topped by Mace, but SARDI new variety agronomy team leader Rob Wheeler is urging farmers to keep in mind the wheat's disease profile.
An AGT line, Mace is derived from Wyalkatchem, but has an AH classification and taller plant height.
"Although Mace has good resistance to the older WA stripe rust race, it is rated as susceptible to very susceptible to the WA+ Yr17 stripe rust strain and if grown, must be carefully monitored," he said. "It is best avoided in districts prone to stripe rust unless a fungicide regime is in place."
Mace has been widely tested since 2009 in NVT in SA and is showing wide adaptation coupled with high yield potential with wheat-on-wheat application.
The variety is moderately resistant to moderately susceptible to stem rust, moderately resistant to leaf rust and is rated moderately reistant to moderately susceptible to cereal cyst nematode and pratylenchus neglectus.
While Mace produced the highest average yield of 3.89 tonnes a hectare across all NVT sites, Scout was close behind, at only 2 per cent lower than Mace.
Scout was developed and released from Longreach Plant Breeders as an APW quality variety with mid-season maturity and is derived from Yitpi.
"It has good resistance to stem and leaf rust and the WA stripe rust pathotypes but it is rated moderately susceptible to the WA+Yr17 pathotype in eastern Australia," he said.
Scout is resistant to CCN and moderatly resistant to moderately susceptible to powdery mildew but rated susceptible to very susceptible to yellow leaf spot, like Yitpi. It has good physical grain quality and similar sprouting tolerance to Yitpi but slightly more susceptibility to black point.
Mr Wheeler said new varieites were offering good opportunities for durum growers.
While the unreleased breeders line WID803 topped the trials in 2011, Tjilkuri only yielded 2pc less. Tjilkuri also yielded 6pc more on average than Tamaroi.
"Tjilkuri has a similar maturity, adaptation and disease resistance profile to Tamaroi, but generally offers greater yields, together with improved semolina colour," Mr Wheeler said.
Average site yields for durum were 3.98 t/ha, yielding similar to adjacent bread wheat trials in the Mid North but 14pc below in Yorke Peninsula where weather conditions were perhaps harsher for durums.
Sites featured generally low screenings, high test weights and moderate to high grain protein.
Mr Wheeler said above average grain yields and excellent grain quality were a feature of many wheat variety trials in SA during 2011.
"The regular use of fungicides for stripe rust control within wheat NVT has reduced the impact of disease on grain yield performance, therefore placing greater importance on the use of disease guides for varietal choice," he said.
"This is a further reminder of the need to minimise or avoid sowing of susceptible varieties which do not meet minimum disease standards unless a vigilant and successful disease control strategy is in place."
NVT trials were run across 25 sites in SA in 2011, with yields ranging from 1.4t/ha at Wanbi to 6.6 t/ha at Cummins.
There was only one site failure, with the trial at Penong failing because of variability from grass competition.
*Full report in Stock Journal, February 9 issue, 2012.
