A LOT has changed in the last 100 years, as 140 visitors found out at the Merredin Research Station 100th field day last week.
For starters, at its inauguration, the field day attracted 400 farmers from across the Wheatbelt.
At this time wheat varieties Nabawa and Merredin were proving quite successful and another two Dindiloa and Carrabin were being tested by growers.
Fast forward 100 years and a cross section of generations, city and country dwellers, interested in both the history and future of wheat breeding piled into the Station grounds to explore some exciting new trials.
Visitors were loaded into half a dozen buses and led to several of the most exciting trials on the property.
In 2013, 25 new trials have been undertaken at the Station and five off the Station, but the day began with an exclusive preview of new chickpea and field pea varieties offering high yields and disease resistance.
While many of the 2013 trials are still in their infancy, the advancements in technology and understanding of climatic conditions and variables were obvious.
Department of Agriculture and Food (DAFWA) development officer Ian Pritchard said growers needed to consider the break-crop benefits which field peas, and to a lesser extent chickpeas, provided for wheat crops in coming years.
"For example the nitrogen supply and disease break which crop legumes provide needs to be factored into any decision on where these crops fit into the farming system," Mr Pritchard said.
After another short bus ride farmers were taken to a series of trials that explored wheat variety selection and agronomy in dry environments.
The aim of these trials is to identify varieties for yield and grain quality stability with adaption to drought, heat stress and tight finishes in low rainfall areas.
Growers were then directed to trials designed to investigate whether wheat row spacing can help supply stored soil water later into the season in a dry finish.
With climate change models predicting less growing season rainfall and more summer rain in the eastern Wheatbelt, DAFWA researchers said it was important to find techniques that would help alleviate the winter rainfall deficits.
One bright, young, Southern Cross grower may have just the solution to this.
Callum Wesley has developed a device which forms a firm soil mound between the furrows in a seeder, that is designed to harvest water into the furrow.
With 2cm RTK autosteer and on clay soils, this has the potential to produce a wet enough zone from any summer rainfall to allow wheat germination on a small opening winter rainfall event.
Mr Wesley has applied for a provisional patent and, if commercialised, the device could provide a viable way to maintain the compaction of soil between the rows of crops for water harvesting purposes.
While many of the trials were exploring options to combat losses due to early water deficits, the day was balanced with historical facts and examples of how trials conducted at the Research Station had helped to shape the present.
DAFWA grains industry executive director Mark Sweetingham said the Station remained at the forefront of research into agriculture, playing an important part in much of the advice and technology made available to growers in the eastern Wheatbelt.
"In 1969, WA suffered a serious drought which decimated crops, resulting in very little wheat being harvested," Dr Sweetingham said.
"In 2010, an almost identical dry season was experienced across the Wheatbelt, yet growers averaged nearly one tonne per hectare of wheat
"The reason for the difference in wheat yields, under very similar seasonal conditions, is that during the intervening 40 years, research and development by the department in partnership with an innovative farming community resulted in the adoption of better varieties and better crop production systems."
At lunch time, with steak sandwiches in hand, attendees gathered into the old station shed and heard about the fascinating history the Research Station holds.
Well known InterGrain wheat breeder Robin Wilson offered a rare glimpse of its achievements and the people that have made them possible.
According to Mr Wilson, wheat breeding in Australia was started by Wlliam Farrer, near Canberra, at the beginning of the 20th century.
"In 1916 WA was making good progress in wheat production using wheats from the east," he said.
The first wheat produced in WA was called Gresley and was developed by a farmer, C Harper, in co-operation with an editor of an agricultural newspaper, WS Grasby.
"It was a dual-purpose wheat, suitable for grain and hay," Mr Wilson said.
"It is important to remember that in those days the tractors were horses and they needed to be fed."
These varieties are a far cry from those developed in the last decade with comprehensive disease resistance packages and much higher yields.
And the Merredin Research Station has played a significant part in this.
Dr Sweetingham said many of the advancements in cropping hinged on the advent of minimum tillage, which revolutionised the way crops were sown.
"Long-term research at Merredin demonstrated the use of minimum tillage in continuous cropping systems improves soil structure and water-holding capacity," he said.
"Investigations by soil scientists, agriculture engineers and agronomists at Merredin found that some heavy soils responded well to gypsum application.
"This led to the department developing a simple test that growers could use to determine which soils would respond well to gypsum."
