Spring barley lessons from across the Irish sea

摘要

Maximising spring barley yields was a key topic at an arable conference held at Greenmount College in Northern Ireland. Spring barley is a key crop in Ireland with top growers achieving consistently high yields, even in challenging seasons, by focusing on disease control and understanding their soils. With the area of UK spring barley set to soar this year because of the wet autumn, growers could well pick up some tips from their Irish cousins growing crops in often more testing conditions. Specialist barley grower and former Fanner Focus writer Philip Reck, farms 850ha of spring barley in County Wexford in southeastern Ireland, and so is well qualified to give some pointers to UK farmers, with the HGCA predicting a 40% rise in spring barley area this year.