Two new Limagrain wheat varieties are expected to make a significant impact on the market. Hard wheats have jumped in popularity since 2022, with Limagrain reportedly servicing 30.1% of the market currently.
LG Defiance and LG Challenger are new Group 4 hard wheat entrants on the AHDB Recommended List, and Limagrain believes that of the substantial market these will take between 8-9% and 2-3% respectively. The smaller proportion of LG Challenger is due to challenges in establishing the seed crop last year.
Both have good pedigrees. LG Defiance is a combination of KWS Extase and Gleam, while LG Challenger is parented by a combination of Gravity and SY Insitor, with LG Skyscraper. They join the List with an average treated yield of 109% for LG Defiance and 107% for LG Challenger, with only KSW Aintree positioned above them.
Regionally, both are consistent, with LG Defiance rated at 108% for the East, 110% for the West and 109% for the North, with an untreated yield of 95%. LG Challenger sits at 107% for both the East and West, 109% for the North and has an untreated yield of 93%.
Ron Granger, arable technical manager, said that growers were specifically looking for consistency of yield and disease resistance in new varieties. As such, both come with a strong suite of traits. Yellow rust resistance is ranked at 8 for LG Defiance and 7 for LG Challenger, septoria is 6.3 and 6.1, and fusarium is 7 for both. They also include resistance to orange wheat blossom midges.
“The yellow rust rating is critical,” Ron says. “Growers were caught out by the YR15 outbreak last year, and will likely have established crops that remain vulnerable this year, so they will be looking closely at varieties with strong resistance.”
Performance with PGRs
Ron expressed some confusion about the performance scores with plant growth regulators (PGRs). Both varieties were scored a 7 for lodging without PGR, and LG Challenger retained this score with PGR. However, LG Defiance scored a 5 when PGRs were applied.
“There isn’t a lot of data to support that score,” he says. “And we have not seen anything to suggest that lodging is an issue when PGRs are applied during our own trials.”
Indeed, he said that Defiance is a tall variety that will require a good PGR programme. It responds best to a split application and a strong fungicide programme, with trials in Scotland suggesting that lodging was less than 5%. Ron adds that the reduced height after PGR applications did not impact final yield potential, and he expected the market response to be like LG Skyscraper or LG Redwald.
“If growers are concerned, they can drill later or hold LG Defiance back as a second wheat,” he says.
LG Defiance is best suited to drilling after the 25th of September, with yield potential being 109% before the 31st of October, and dropping to 108% when drilled from November onwards, enabling it to be placed in the rotation after maize or root crops. This is compared to LG Challenger, which the company believes will be an all-rounder, with yield potential reaching 110% when drilled early, but only dropping to 106% with November establishment.
Both are also well-suited as second wheats, with yield potentials reaching 110%, and the strong yields appear to be consistent across light and heavy soils.
Looking at other key attributes, both have a protein content of more than 10%, increasing to 11.3% when grown to milling specification. The Hagberg Falling Number is 260 for LG Defiance and 295 for LG Challenger, while the specific weight is 77kg/hl and 78.6kg/hl, respectively.
View from the farm
Rob Atkins, who farms in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, is trialling LG Defiance across 5ha this season. His rotation is typically two wheat crops, followed by a cover and spring barley, with break crops of oilseed rape, beans, maize or oats.
He saw the plots of Defiance at Cereals last year and believed that the high yield and good disease resistance would help him limit chemical costs in the spring. “We try and stretch our applications,” he says. “We put around 24 days between our T0 and T1 timings, so the second application went on just before the bank holiday.”
LG Defiance was established on the 29th September – a little earlier than he would have liked, but the threat of rain pushed operations on. “Despite the risk of brome and blackgrass, it showed excellent vigour in the spring and is currently the cleanest crop on the farm.”
He concluded by saying the industry would need more varieties that could look after themselves, especially as the UK realigns with the European Union, which puts several chemicals at risk of being axed.