Wheat contestants busy

Press, 4 June 1982, Page 17

Wheat contestants busy

Wheat 82 competition entrant, Mr Hugh Horn of Oxford, cultivates his plot before sowing, in a picture taken in May on the Lincoln College farm site of the competition. After a quiet period on the site since the competition was launched tn March, things have hotted up lately, with work being done on all eight plots.

Competition rules say there is no telling about what individual entrants are up to until at least a month after any techniques have been used, but several plots have been sown, and preparations have been' carried out on those plots which, apparently, will be direct drilled.

interest is high in the field days which will be held on the site on December 1 and 2 this year.

“Commercial firms are really getting behind the competition, because they can see the interest it is raising in the arable sector,” said Mr Michael Beaven, the man who has done the spade work to get Wheat 82 off the ground.

More than half the demonstration plots for the field days have been taken up, mainly by chemical firms and plant breeders. Machinery firms are expected to more than fill the

demand for remaining plots within a short time. The M.A.F. and D.S.I.R. have taken up wheat growing sites alongside the entrants’ plots, and they intend to demonstrate some new, and some older, techniques and cultivars. M.A.F. is expected to use at least half of its plot to demonstrate the all-in approach to wheat growing that has been put forward to growers recently by Mr Bede McCloy. and other researchers. New and old cultivars should raise a lot of interest on the D.S.I.R. plot. They will be growing the 10 current commercial cultivars, and as well they have a couple of museum pieces — the 1935 bred Cross 7, and a sample of the original Hilgendorf, bred in 1947.

They will also be showing some experimental material which might not be of practical interest, but should have a lot of curiosity value. A variety from Hungary, for example, produces huge heads but a disappointing amount of grain. Others have spectacular yields, but very poor quality. Meanwhile, Mr Beaven has left Lincoln College and the competition. His role organising Wheat 82 has been taken over by the newly appointed college assistant extension officer, Mr. John Callan.