IN recent years, some growers have been experiencing poor germination of lupin crops grown from retained seed and as a result, the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) has launched two new research projects to better understand the issue.
With these concerns in mind, the Liebe Group has joined the GRDC's investigation into the key issues affecting the profitability of lupin growers in Western Australia.
Contributing factors for poor establishment may include Manganese (Mn) deficiency, variety, harvester settings and moisture at harvest, but there is limited information available as to which are the most significant and most easily ameliorated factors.
To help understand the effect these factors have on germination, the Liebe Group will work with 20 growers from across the region to sample and conduct germination and manganese testing on seed of some commonly grown lupin varieties.
Over the past two weeks, Liebe Group staff have collected pre-harvest lupin samples from paddocks destined for use as seed and will collect post-harvest samples from storage.
Samples of Barlock, Coramup, Gunyidi, Jurien and Mandelup lupin varieties have all been collected to understand any varietal differences, with some of these crops having had Manganese applied within the season while others have had none.
Germination testing will take place using the post-harvest samples collected from storage and will be repeated after seeding, with seed to be taken from seeder boots.
The Liebe Group will also conduct in-house testing to compare results with those of the official germination tests.
Results of this testing should better identify some of the potential causes or poor germination rates in lupin crops.
Results of this project, including an economic analysis, will be developed into a fact sheet and published in the 2020/21 Liebe Group R&D book that will be publicly available on the Liebe Group website at liebegroup.org.au and on the GRDC website at grdc.com.au
To learn more about this project, contact the Liebe Group on 9661 1907.