RESEARCH is underway in Australia's high rainfall zones (HRZ) to push the bar higher for ultra-high yielding wheat, barley and canola crops.
The Hyper Yielding Crops project, run by Field Applied Research Research (FAR) Australia with funding support from the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) is running sites in five states to take a look at what the economically attainable yield limits for broadacre cropping are.
Nick Poole, FAR Australia managing director said the sites were at Albany, Western Australia, Millicent, SA, Gnarwarre, near Winchelsea, Victoria, Hagley, northern Tasmania and Wallendbeen in southern NSW.
He said cropping farmers in Australia's HRZs could be losing out on potential yield.
A comparison between Australia's HRZ and other similar climate zones such as New Zealand and Europe finds Aussie yields generally down, although wheat quality is often higher.
However, the gap is narrowing and farmers in milder Australian climates are now growing 10 tonne to the hectare cereal crops in favourable conditions on a commercial scale.
"A previous hyper yielding project in Tasmania found that it was possible to significantly improve yields through a combination of sowing the right varieties and effective implementation of the right management strategies," Mr Poole said.
"Mainland Australia is not like Tasmania climate-wise but we feel there are common threads to the research," he said.
The FAR Australia research has found there is no one silver bullet to boost yields, but rather a combination of a number of factors.
"Germplasm developments are going to be important, our requirements are changing as we embrace agronomic change such as alterations to preferred time of sowing, pushing it earlier and earlier with success," said Mr Poole.
"We are at a stage where there is not a lot of varietal choice suited to the longer growing season we are now looking for."
As part of that, Mr Poole said the Gnarwarre site was trialling both winter and spring germplasm to see whether the longer season winter varieties had a fit in higher yielding parts of the country.
He said many of the key requirements were not a major priority in the nation's mainstream cereal producing regions.
"Something like straw strength, to stop lodging when the plant has high yield potential, is very important, whereas you very rarely have issues with wheat lodging in somewhere like the Wimmera or the Mallee regions in SA or Victoria."
"We, as HRZs, are a small area in the national context, and commercial breeding decisions are not necessarily made with these regions in mind so we have to look outside the square, we have to keep looking at international germplasm as well as longer season domestic cultivars and how they fit in our systems."
Mr Poole said other management strategies being closely monitored included nitrogen and disease management.
"On the nitrogen front we're looking at the top end requirements and seeing just how much is necessary to target those high end yields," he said.
In terms of impediments to yield, he said fungal disease control was the major focus of the research.
"Septoria tritici blotch (STB) is the major threat to wheat in the Eastern states but in favourable years stripe rust is still capable of causing significant damage, as is the case this season."
Mr Poole said the Hyper Yielding Crops initiative now wanted to set up an awards program among farmers in high yielding regions to raise awareness about the potential of the areas.
The HYC awards program will initially look at yield, but other factors, such as percentage of water limited yield achieved and best gross margins are also flagged to be included.
"The aim is to connect like-minded growers to help them share their experiences," he said.
The Gnarwarre field day was at a site on land provided by local farmer Ewen Peel.