Throughout the months of July, August and September Southern Farming Systems (SFS) are holding a ‘Tour the Sites’ program. It is a series of field walks/focus group sessions across SFS’ main branch regions in Victoria of Geelong, Streatham and Hamilton. These sessions will be focussing on both cropping and pastures systems at SFS trial sites and/or on farm visits. The tours will run in the lead up to SFS’ premier field day, AgriFocus, to be held on the 18^th of October at the Streatham trial site.

The July event was held between the 18^th to 20^th at SFS’ main cropping sites for 2023. Growers, advisers, and industry representatives gathered at the Hamilton, Streatham, and Inverleigh trial sites to view field trials and engage in discussion.

Some of the topics that were discussed included, variety performance and selection. The GRDC National Variety Trials (NVT) across each of the SFS main sites and with new varieties emerging nearly every season, these trials are a great way to track varieties throughout the year and assess their phenology, disease and lodging resistance, and importantly grain yield. With over 150 varieties in the program across canola, barley, wheat, oats and faba beans there is always something interesting to look at.

Another topic included an update from Steve Marcroft of Marcroft Grains Pathology on the role of major gene resistance and cultivar quantitative resistance of blackleg in canola. Steve spoke about the current work being done on developing a robust blackleg rating system for upper canopy infection (UCI) to help with management decisions around the use of UCI fungicides.

Other topics discussed centred around the recurring challenges of slug management, early season waterlogging/spring recovery options, weed control including herbicide products, efficacy and timings, and soil health.

Save the dates for the next series of Tour the Sites 22-24 August, 13-15 September and the main SFS field day event, AgriFocus 18 October.