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GRAIN
SCIENCE
NEWS
Goodtogrow
WHILE DEVELOPING HIGHER-
yielding varieties is always a central
objective, improving other agronomic
and quality characteristics in cereal crops
can be an equal and sometimes greater
challenge. This according to western Ca-
nadian wheat and barley breeders who’ve
worked within the wheat and barley
clusters of the
Growing Forward 2
ag devel-
opment program.
Nature often wants to deliver a trade-
off, say breeders. Improving one char-
acteristic in a new variety often dimin-
ishes another aspect related to quality
or production. Breaking that link is the
challenge facing plant breeders, said
the University of Alberta’s Dean Spaner.
He heads a breeding program primarily
focused on developing early-maturing
Canada Western Red Spring (CWRS)
wheat varieties.
Meanwhile, at the University of Sas-
katchewan’s Crop Development Centre
(CDC), Aaron Beattie heads a breeding
program that is developing malting
and feed barley varieties. The crops are
different but the objective is the same: to
produce varieties with top yield, excellent
quality and appealing agronomics that
will be profitable for farmers to grow.
EARLY-MATURING WHEAT
VARIETIES
While it is not easy getting a new variety
to fire on all the production and quality
characteristic cylinders, Spaner can point
to several recent successes in the U of A
wheat-breeding program. Over the past
five years, he has registered five CWRS
varieties—all with earlier maturity—that
have been favoured by farmers and end us-
ers, particularly bread makers. This wave
of new CWRS varieties is the first to come
out of the U of A wheat-breeding program
since Alikat in 1997. Spaner devotes about
75 per cent of his breeding program to
CWRS variety development and about 25
per cent to Canada Prairie Spring Red and
other wheat types.
CWRS varieties developed at the U of
A include Thorsby, Coleman, Parata, Go
Early and Zealand. All are early-maturing
top yielders with good agronomic per-
formance and excellent milling quality.
Coleman, Parata and Go Early are the
earliest maturing of the five.
“Our growing season in central and
northern Alberta is much different than
the southern Prairie region,” said Spaner.
“The growing season around Edmonton,
for example, can be two to three weeks
shorter than at Lethbridge. Here at the
University of Alberta, we have the nat-
ural advantage to select for early matu-
rity.” Spaner can select those lines that
reach maturity under the area’s growing
conditions.
And what is early? Using a popular
CWRS variety such as AC Barrie as a
benchmark, Spaner said, on average, it
will mature at 100 days. “What we are
looking for are varieties that mature at
least two to four days earlier,” he said.
“Once you get into this northern Parkland
region, we only have a 99-day growing
season. We need varieties that mature in
less than 100 days.”
Selecting varieties that mature early is
an important element in protecting grain
quality. Even and early crop maturity po-
tentially provides farmers the opportunity
to straight-cut crops ahead of frost, thus
avoiding the risk of downgraded quality.
And even swathed crops can be harvested
Winter
2018
Grains
West
48
BREEDINGPROGRAMS PRODUCENEWWHEAT ANDBARLEY VARIETIES
Working with the
Growing Forward 2
wheat and barley clusters, the University of Alberta’s breeding program has
focused on CanadaWestern Red Spring wheat varieties.