Many barley varieties recover from winter injury and perform very well in trials
Our 2014 Winter Barley Performance Trial was conducted at the Russell Larson Research Farm at Rock Springs, PA and the results have been posted. The trial consisted of 15 experimental and commercial hulled lines, 3 hulless lines and 3 malting barley lines. The test experienced some winter injury, which impacted the performance of some lines, but some recovered remarkably well. Yields ranged from 117.9 to 51.9 bu/acre on a 48 lb basis. Test weights were very good with the hulled lines averaging over 51 lb/bu and the hulless lines averaging over 60 lb/bu.
Yield performance was surprising following the winter conditions, which included 8 days with low temperatures below 0 F at this location. The test was planted early in mid September and had some fall fertilizer applied, and both contributed to good fall growth and winter survival. Winter injury was most severe in the malting barley lines and one of the hulless lines, Eve.
In the hulled entries, most of the lines had awns except for Valor, Nomini and Growmark FS 501. Of these lines without awns Valor had the highest yield at 94.2 bu/acre and was the tallest at 40 inches. Among the awned entries, a Virginia Tech experimental line topped the test at 117.9 bu/acre followed by Growmark FS 950 at 106.9 bu/acre.
In the hulless test, the variety Dan had the highest yield at 85.7 bu/acre and exhibited excellent winter hardiness. The new hulless line, VA07H-31WS had a yield of 75.7 bu/a and slightly lower rating for winter hardiness.
We also included three prospective malting barley lines due to the interest in growing malting barley. Endeavor and Charles are two row winter types and Maja is a six row winter types. Each of these had noticeably more winter injury than most of the feed barleys in the test. Endeavor and Charles appeared to recover surprisingly well.
For more information on winter barley performance review results at Virginia Tech and the University of Delaware .
Source : psu.edu