Had an idea for an advertising campaign based on the purple colour of the ears that matches black-grass almost perfectly:

Have a black-grass problem?

Go naked to hide your shame!

Harper Adams naked barley has been carefully colour-matched to hide the dirty purple stain of black-grass on your field - if your neighbours can't see, you can pretend it isn't there! 

On a more serious note - after crunching the data, I saw that the GAI (Green Area Index) of the facultative barley in November was more than twice that of KWS Cassia, so much more competitive in autumn when most black-grass germinates.

Other reasons to grow my barley:

2-row vs. KWS Cassia

6-row with 108 grains per ear

Many farmers complain about the trend for modern varieties to be late maturing - be careful what you wish for: this will be ready in a month (late June).

Why vernalisation matters

Vernalisation, the need for a period of cold over winter before a plant can switch from vegetative to reproductive development, is sometimes seen as a bit of a nuisance. It imposes a 'last safe sowing date', meaning that seed sown in the spring will not produce grains.

However, if the vernalisation requirement is very low or non-existant, early autumn sown crops are vulnerable to precocious ear development and frost damage as seen in the ICARDA-bred barley below.  October sowing of this variety has been OK in the past, but September 20 was too early, especially with the very mild autumn we had in 2013.

Fortunately the variety bred at Harper Adams from a UK x ICARDA cross (on the left) looks better (ICARDA on the right).  Best ear I have found in this population so far is a 6-row with 18 triplets on each side = 18 x 3 x 2 = 108 grains per ear! Hope we get enough sun to fill all those grains.

   

Naked barley beats-up black-grass

Public enemy number one for many arable farmers is black-grass.

Below is a photo of the rhizotron root chambers we've set up for Cereals 2014 next month.

Spring wheat and one of my spring naked barley lines were sown along with black-grass.

The barley on the left has far more competitive shoot-growth; longer, broader leaves that sprawl over the ground to cut out light to the weeds.  What I didn't expect was the difference in root growth.  The wheat on the right is being out-competed below ground, and most of the root mass in the upper soil layer is black-grass, allowing the weed to strangle the wheat.  

The barley roots are out-competing the black-grass; but what is also interesting is that the barley plants aren't competing as strongly with each other.  The crown roots grow at 45 degrees until they meet roots from their neighbour barley plant, then grow downwards.  They do not invade each other's space or grow under their neighbour.  On the other hand, they show no such respect to the black-grass, cutting across, undermining and generally out-muscling them.

Another good reason to grow a bit less wheat and a bit more (preferably naked) barley.