Grainswest - Winter 2023

Winter 2023 grainswest.com 23 Instead, they had to enlist the help of local breeders to make selections. This required a lot of trust, but they had no choice. “We had to rely on local expertise,” he said. “It cost us a lot of money because they have to hire somebody to do the local breeder selections for us. Obviously, the breeder, they know breeding, but they’re not familiar with [Canadian] genetic material, so they don’t know exactly what to look for, but, we had to do something. It was just a makeshift solution to get by and do something.” In addition to freight costs, scientists on both sides must deal with shipping delays. However, with COVID largely over, the process now runs more smoothly and is nearly back to its pre-pandemic state. This growing season, Randhawa believes he and his colleagues will be able to visit New Zealand by mid-February, if not earlier, to make selections; about a month later, the promising genetics will be returned to Canada. The team in New Zealand have become rote masters at contra breeding. For them, it’s simple. They plant, harvest and thresh and send back the genetics. They do not do any testing or analysis. At most, they will spray a fungicide or do some grain drying. In the case of spring wheat, for example, they will dry the grain down from between 14 and 18 per cent to less than 13 per cent. This is done in part to ensure moisture content won’t affect future germination or cause spoilage in transit once the grain is bagged. The New Zealand Institute for Plant and Food Research has long grown Western Canada’s premier wheat varieties on a contra basis. This government Crown corporation carries out the work through CropSeed, a standalone company it owns. CropSeed also manages other work for its clients, such as small plot harvesting and seed cleaning for high value seed lines. According to Andy Hay, the company’s science team leader for cereals and services, the terrain of his country is a strong match relative to many parts of Alberta and Western Canada as a whole. It’s a natural fit as the geographic location for the contra growth of Canadian grains. Palmerston North is a hotbed of agricultural activity and often is the country’s top producing barley area. It’s also home to a pair of New Zealand’s biggest rivers, the Whanganui and the Manawatu. Its humid location is an ideal setting for cereal disease screening. The Canterbury Plains region is simply excellent for producing cereals and pulses and is Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada wheat breeder Harpinder Randhawa describes contra season cropping as foundational to Canadian crop breeding. Pictured here at the New Zealand Institute for Plant and Food Research breeding facility on the Canterbury Plains, his plots are outlined in red. Photos:CourtesyofHarpinderRandhawa