A perfect year for testing drought-tolerance in wheat varieties
Agronomists still able to gain much data from variety trials across the region
With 2011 going into the record books as one of the driest in the High Plains, many dryland wheat acres wereabandoned and irrigated yields suffered as producers had to allocate water to other crops, according to a Texas AgriLife Extension Service agronomist.
Dr. Brent Bean, AgriLife Extension agronomist in Amarillo, said insect infestation and disease infections were low throughout most of the region and only a few low-lying fields in the southwest Panhandle were damaged from freeze injury. So the biggest contributor to the wheat crop’s demise was drought.
However, AgriLife Extension was still able to gain much data from variety trials across the region that will be useful as producers begin planning the new crop, Bean said. Seven of the nine dryland trials planted were harvested, as were trials at six irrigated locations around the High Plains and the New Mexico State University station near Clovis, N.M.
Across the region, most harvested wheat fields were planted late on land fallowed in 2010.
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