Spring oats have attracted interest from growers in East Anglia looking for a spring crop option but there are a number of agronomy challenges associated with producing a milling quality sample in the region. Recent research is starting to deliver some answers.
Spring oats tick a number of boxes for eastern counties growers. There is a growing market for the grain, with demand increasing by close to 5% a year over the last 10 years and showing little sign of slowing. There is a local miller, Richardsons Milling, Bedford. And spring oats are can be grown as a lower input crop, reducing cashflow and workload pressures.
But there are some challenges, not least that achieving good milling quality in the region can be difficult and there is a dearth of information on how the crop is best managed.
However, a number of recent and ongoing oat research projects are delivering useful results.
The East Anglian Spring Oat Project (EASOP), supported by the Chadacre Agricultural Trust and the Felix Cobbold Trust and led by ADAS, was completed last year and sought to tackle some of the challenges identified following a survey of spring oat growers in the region. The lack of crop management advice was high on the list.
Another project, Opti-Oat, funded by UK Research and innovation and led by Pepsico, was also completed last year. This aimed to help growers achieve better oat yields and quality by using new technologies and decision support tools.
One key output from Opti-Oat was the development of the first Oat Growth Guide, published in June 2019, providing previously unavailable crop growth benchmarks through the season, including establishment and tiller counts and green area indices.
Some of the findings to emerge from the EASOP project are now helping inform seed rate, drilling date and plant growth regulator (PGR) decisions. In two years of trials in Suffolk, higher seed rates (410 seeds/sq.m) resulted in up to 0.22t/ha extra yield, compared to crops planted at 325 seeds/sq.m.
Additionally, its findings indicate that splitting PGR applications appears to be more effective, although this approach can be difficult to manage in spring oats because of the crop's quick progress through growth stages.
Much of the recent research has targeted crop nutrition and work continues in this area, as the RB209 fertiliser manual contains no detail on nitrogen rate or timings for spring oats, says ADAS crop physiologist Dr Sarah Clarke.
Average
To tackle this knowledge gap, AHDB has funded the NoatS project, which commenced in August 2018 and involves a number of partners along the oat supply chain.
A survey conducted ahead of trials work revealed growers were applying on average 118kg N/ha to spring oats, with about half of this applied in the seedbed.
However, data gathered from other recent UK trials, from Teagasc in Ireland and from Danish nitrogen trials showed an average optimum N rate for spring oats of 183kg N/ha.
"So a lot higher than what is being done at the moment and what is in the current RB209 recommendations," says Dr Clarke.
Timing
Results on N timing have been mixed, with better results coming from split timings and early applications in some trials, and from single applications and/or later timings in others. But what the results do show is having too many grains and not being able to fill them is detrimental to quality.
"The main message from all the research is having the correct number of grains and filling them sufficiently to get a good specific weight and kernel content is the way we should be going," says Dr Clarke.
Key messages
- Understanding of spring oats physiology and agronomy is improving
- Trials results suggest moderately high seed rates and split plant growth regulator applications are beneficial to yield in East Anglia
- NoatS project will be carrying out two more seasons of spring oats trials on N rates and timings
- Aim should be to fill all grains which are formed to maximise quality
