VIRGINIA

Winter Barley Production and Research in 2007

W.S. Brooks, M.E. Vaughn, C.A. Griffey, W.E Thomason, J. E. Seago, and E.G. Hokanson

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Growing Conditions

Planting conditions in the fall of 2006 were favorable. Temperatures in October were near normal and slightly higher than average in November. Rainfall and unseasonably warm temperatures in early winter favored small-grain development, especially for late plant stands. Temperatures in January were near average and more than seven degrees above the long-term average for that time of year resulting in a boost in small-grain growth. Cool temperatures and dry weather in February and March delayed the development of small grains fields in some Counties. The ‘Easter Freeze” was especially hard on barley fields, but the Virginia crop fared much better than many of our neighbors. More damage was reported in early-heading cultivars. Dry and warm conditions at harvest time facilitated a timely harvest.

Diseases

Leaf rust (Puccinia hordei) and net blotch (Pyrenophora teres) were the most prevalent diseases noted in the state tests in 2007. Both diseases were rated or assessed in barley tests grown in the western and eastern parts of Virginia. In southwestern Virginia, at the Kentland Farm near Blacksburg, leaf rust severity (0= no disease to 9= near total leaf area coverage) ranged from 1 to 8 in the hulless barley lines and from 1 to 9 in hulled lines. Net blotch severity ranged from 3 to 8 in the hulless lines and from 1 to 8 in the hulled lines. Leaf rust severity in barley tests grown at Painter on the Eastern Shore of Virginia ranged from 1 to 7 in both hulless and hulled barley lines. Net blotch was present but incidence was low in Eastern Virginia state barley tests in 2007.

Production

Virginia producers planted 48,000 acres (19,430 ha) of barley in 2006-07, 10,000 acres (4050 ha) less than the previous year. An estimated 30,000 acres (12,145 ha) were harvested with an average yield of 71 bushels per acre (3817 kg/ha). This is six bushels per acre (322 kg/ha) less than the long-term average of 2000-2006.

State Variety Tests

A total of 48 barley entries were evaluated in Virginia’s Official Variety Test at six locations in the Commonwealth in 2007. Twenty-eight hulled and 20 hulless entries were tested. There were five released varieties and 23 experimental lines of hulled barley in 2007. Among the hulless barley entries, three released cultivars and 17 experimental lines were tested. Average yields of hulled lines over the six locations ranged from 71 to 110 bu/a (3820 to 5910 kg/ha) with test weights ranging from 42.3 to 46.8 lb/bu (544 to 602 kg/m³). Yields of the five released cultivars, respectively, were: Thoroughbred - 107 bu/a (5750 kg/ha), Callao - 102 bu/a (5480 kg/ha), Price - 94 bu/a (5050 kg/ha), Wysor - 87 bu/a (4680 kg/ha), and Barsoy - 71 bu/a (3820 kg/ha). Test weights of the released cultivars ranged from 42.3 to 45.5 lbs/bu (544 to 586 kg/m³). Yields of the experimental hulled entries ranged from 92 to 110 bu/a (4950 to 5920 kg/ha). Average yield of hulless entries was 62 bu/a (3330 kg/ha) and ranged from 57 bu/a (3060 kg/ha) to 69 bu/a (3710 kg/ha) across the six locations. Test weights among the hulless barley lines ranged from 53.6 lbs/bu (690 kg/m³) to 60.0 lbs/bu (772 kg/m³). The statewide average test weight of hulless entries was 56.8 lbs/bu (731 kg/m³). Average yield of ‘Eve’, a recently released hulless barley variety from Virginia, was 58 bu/a (3120 kg/ha) with a test weight of 57.9 lb/bu (745 kg/m³) in 2007.

2007 Virginia Barley Yield Contest

The highest yielding entry in the 2007 Barley Yield Contest was 123.57 bu/ac (6643 kg/.ha) submitted by Sanford Farms, Inc., of Westmoreland County growing the variety Thoroughbred. Thoroughbred is a 2003 release of the Virginia Tech Barley breeding program. Awards to the contest winner were sponsored by the Virginia Crop Improvement Association. Congratulations to winners and contestants in the 2007 Virginia Barley Yield Contests.

Barley Research and Outlook for 2008

The Virginia Tech barley breeding program has continued to make progress in developing improve and higher quality hulless barley for domestic ethanol production, animal feed and human consumption. As a result, two winter hulless barley cultivars Doyce and Eve were released from our program. Hulless barley as a crop is exciting because the hull separates from the grain at harvest resulting in an energy rich grain with starch levels generally ranging from 60 to 65 percent, test weights of 56 to 60 lb/bu (720-772 kg/m³) or higher, fiber levels of 2 to 3 percent, and protein contents between 10 to 15 percent. The present focus of the breeding program is placed on developing agronomically desirable varieties of hulless barley to make it a viable crop for area producers. A well-focused and integrated breeding program is essential for developing, maintaining, and expanding hulless barley markets in the region.

This season (2007-2008), we will advance around 300 hulless populations and evaluate over 250 pure lines in yield tests and select pure lines among nearly 11,000 hulless headrows. Thirty-two elite hulless lines are being evaluated in Virginia’s state variety trials. An additional 104 hulless barley lines are being evaluated in five states (Maryland, Kentucky, Delaware, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia).

During the past two years (2006 and 2007), our program continues to collaborate with other barley breeding programs around the country via implementation of the USDA-CSREES Barley Coordinated Agricultural Project (Barley CAP) grant. This cooperative project involving 10 barley breeding programs is evaluating, genetically characterizing and mapping over 40 targeted traits in barley breeding lines. This collaboration allows us to send 96 of our advance barley lines to be evaluated with barley lines from 9 other breeding programs for DNA markers located throughout the genome and also these lines will be evaluated in field tests for important traits of interest. The combined efforts of this project will afford barley breeders with new opportunities to gather and share valuable information and resources, such as germplasm, mapping technology, and genetic markers for a vast number of traits including yield. The Virginia Tech barley breeding program is the only program in the eastern U.S. collaborating in this research. The marker data and field data for barley lines from all breeding programs will be analyzed together using association mapping, which will allow for the identification of specific chromosomes or chromosome regions responsible for or controlling specific traits of interest. Our program role in this grant is to screen the 96 barley lines sent from each breeding program for reaction to two separate races of barley leaf rust, a significant disease of barley in Virginia and one isolate of powdery mildew. Our efforts will continue toward the development of high yielding hulless barley varieties for specific end-use markets benefiting producers in the mid-Atlantic Region.