Development of new frost tolerant Australian malting and feed barley varieties looks promising and should significantly lower the risk and cost of frost damage. Frost tolerant traits have been discovered in a diverse collection of barley lines from other countries, prompting the South Australian Barley Improvement Program to undertake an aggressive breeding strategy to incorporate frost tolerance into commercial barley varieties, Ezigrain posted on August 6.

Several Japanese varieties have recorded particularly low rates of frost induced sterility compared with Australian commercial varieties. Haruna Nijo and Amagi Nijo, for example, had frost induced sterility at rates of 4.5 per cent and 5.4 per cent respectively, compared with the Australian malting variety Schooner at 79.1 %.

As the more frost tolerant varieties are poorly adapted to Australian frost-prone production areas, frost tolerance must be incorporated in commercially relevant germplasm. Genetic control of frost tolerance has now been characterised by University of Adelaide researchers, allowing breeders to 'fast track' the incorporation of frost genes into Australian germplasm. The first potential new varieties are on track to enter preliminary field evaluation next season. The Crop Doctor is GRDC Managing Director, Peter Reading.

06 August, 2004