Forgotten triticale variety can still be your best friend

Triticale attributes like excellent acid soil tolerance, in both top and sub soil, tolerance to high pH issues like boron toxicity, generally good disease tolerance, especially to rusts and yellow leaf spot, useful sodicity tolerance, and probably amongst the cereals the best tolerance to water logging are all important advantages.

Modern varieties also tend to have good grain quality with many developed markets.

On our property, between Coonabarabran and Premer, at the top end of central west NSW, we are swinging over to dual purpose triticale, hopefully the recently released Kokoda variety, this coming season. Dual purpose Eurabbie oats has been our main dual purpose variety and it has performed reliably. However with our trend to earlier sowing, such as 18th February this year, crown and leaf rust have become increasingly a problem.

Central west Local Land Services agriculture adviser Callen Thompson has noted how well some triticale varieties have performed in NSW DPI dual purpose variety trials he has been involved with. For example last year in trials establishes at Purlewaugh (property Peter and Deb Redden) and Bogan Gate (Andrew McPherson) Kokoda topped both trials for combined economic productivity of grazing and grain.

In these trials, comparing a number of wheat, oat, triticale and barley varieties, other varieties also performed well, especially types with winter habit. These include Illabo and Longsword winter wheats and Endeavour as well as Cartwheel triticale.

Because for some years now there has been no winter habit dual purpose oat breeding program in Australia, remaining varieties like Eurabbie have not been upgraded with features like leaf and crown rust resistance. These diseases can decimate autumn and early winter feed, as they did this past season. While fungicide seed as well as crop treatment is an option, timing needs to be spot on (it wasn't for us, that's our fault).

Triticale varieties like Kokoda have excellent ratings against the three rusts; stem, leaf and stripe, making them a much safer bet, especially for early sowing. Kokoda also has good tolerance against barley yellow dwarf virus, a threat to some oat as well as other cereal varieties.

A lot of oats is grown on acid soils, including on our property. While lime use can correct top soil acidity, where subsoils are also acid, as is the case on some of our country, one still needs to grow acid soil tolerant varieties. Most oat varieties have good acid soil tolerance, and most triticale varieties have excellent acid soil tolerance.

Callen Thompson is a strong supporter of dual purpose triticale, largely because of consistent high performance in most of the region's soil types. His observations and involvement with research support their overall excellent grazing performance and when seasons suit their ability to recover well for grain harvest. However, he stresses good performance depends, like for all crops, on good management such as high soil fertility, readiness to sow early, stored fallow moisture and good weed control.

Kokoda also has resistance to cereal cyst nematodes, an important feature in some south western NSW areas. Moderate resistance to Septoria tritici and yellow leaf spot are also important attributes. Grain quality is good with some research supporting it having improved metabolisable energy, especially for pig and chicken enterprises.

A further advantage of triticale over oats is a greater range of registered herbicide options, especially preemergent choices for grass weed and some broadleaf problem ones. Oats still has its advantages and switching from it to triticale will require more attention to rotations to keep risk of crown rot and take all to a minimum.

Kokoda was developed and released by Sydney University and seed is available through Waratah Seed distributors.

Next week: More facts about soil carbon.