It seems a long time ago now, but harvest went exceptionally well this year , a welcome relief after such a busy season. We used our new Zurn160 combine for the first time, and it flew through the breeder seed crops in no time, proving to be a fantastic investment.
Our small team of three, joined by three diligent students, worked incredibly hard throughout the season. A significant portion of our work involved harvesting selected ears by hand, a painstaking task that resulted in almost 11,000 individual ears threshed.
As I write, we’re just finishing the pre-emergence herbicide application after drilling in near-perfect conditions. There have been no slugs to speak of, so no pellets were needed, everything was rolled, and now it’s just a matter of keeping the crows away.
In terms of scale, 2,750 yield plots have been drilled at our site, with an additional 2,000 sent as packets to our out-centres across the UK and Europe. On top of that, we’ve drilled a further 14,000 observation plots, both here at Wardington and at our Septoria nursery in Somerset. It's a relief to finally have everything in the ground.
Looking ahead, our focus now shifts to winter analyses, baking tests, Hagberg Falling Number (HFN) evaluations, genomic predictions, and any other assessments we can run on the harvest samples to gather as much data as possible on each breeding line.
We were pleased to see Arlington getting redrilled in Recommended List trials, it had yet another very good year in trials with some very high untreated yields. We have 30 tonnes in storage, ready to be baked at scale before year-end. Meanwhile, 323114 (Carfax) was set to join the RL trials but narrowly missed out for reasons beyond our control. Champion received some negative press due to shifts in the yellow rust pathogen, but where it has been selected for Septoria resistance and yield, it continues to deliver, proving that context is key.
Breeding wheat is truly a team effort, and none of this would have been possible without the dedication, long hours, and enthusiasm of Graham Urquhart and Clare Moscrop. From selection through to harvest, seed preparation, and drilling — their commitment has been invaluable.