The impact of seed treatments and foliar fungicides and their interaction with variety resistance and plant growth regulators on barley productivity and quality

This Barley Research Cluster project was funded by Alberta Barley in collaboration with the Atlantic Grains Council, the Brewing and Malting Barley Research Institute, Rahr Malting and the Western Grains Research Foundation via the AgriInnovation Program.

Project lead: Dr. T. Kelly Turkington, Research Scientist
Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

Start Date: April 2013

End Date: March 2018

Alberta Barley’s contribution: $92,080
Total funding from other partners: $493,644

Benefits for barley farmers:
Plant growth regulators (PGR) application might help to optimize yield and quality of malting barley by mitigating the effects of lodging, especially in conjunction with fungicide application. Limiting the amount of lodging might help to reduce microbial load and toxin contamination of harvested grain.

Summary:
The project aims to 1) determine the impact of seed treatments, PGRs and fungicide timing on crop health, disease levels, productivity and quality in barley; 2) assess the interaction of disease resistance with seed treatments and fungicides; and 3) assess the interactive effects of PGR application and head-emergence fungicide application on malting barley quality, yield, microbial load and mycotoxin level.