- Author: Mark Lundy
- Author: Dinh Giang
- Author: Taylor Nelsen
- Author: Saarah Kuzay
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Due to the health concerns surrounding COVID-19, we had to cancel our annual field day that typically occurs in May at UC Davis. While there is no full replacement for seeing field trials in person, the UC small grains research and extension team has been hard at work developing extension resources that we can share digitally. Please take a moment to visit our 2020 Virtual Small Grains Field Day:
http://smallgrains.ucanr.edu/Field_Days/2020_Virtual_Field_Day/
- Author: Mark Lundy
- Author: Taylor Nelsen
- Author: Konrad Mathesius
- Author: Nicholas Clark
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Measuring soil nitrogen (N) prior to fertilizing can improve N fertilizer management. The soil nitrate quick test is a simple and low-cost test. It provides a ballpark estimate of the soil nitrate-N concentration in the rootzone. Nitrate is a highly plant-available form of nitrogen. Using the soil nitrate quick test when N fertilizer decisions are being made will help define a range of fertilizer rates appropriate for that field. This can provide several benefits. These include improved N use efficiency, lower input costs, improved grain yield or grain protein, and reduced N loss to the air or below the crop rootzone.
Over the...
- Author: Sarah Light
We hope you can join us for our field day! Agenda and directions are below. Contact Sarah Light with questions: selight@ucanr.edu ~ 530-822-7515.
Wheat Field Day
Colusa County, CA
Tuesday March 12th, 2019 ~ 8:30-11:00am
8:30 am Registration
9:00...
- Author: Mark Lundy
After a relatively dry start to the rainfall season from October through early November, rainfall in California since November has been above average. About halfway through the rainy season, year-to-date precipitation totals are approximately 20-30% greater than the 10-year average in the small grain growing regions of California (Figure 1).
Growing degree days (GDD: 86F max; 45F min) for common wheat and other small grains have been accumulating more rapidly than the 10-year average since the middle of November (Figure 2), which has been primarily a function of warmer than average night-time temperatures (Figure 3).
The UC Small Grain Testing Program established small grain variety...
- Author: Mark Lundy
After almost 6 weeks without a substantial rainstorm, there is finally some precipitation starting to appear in the 10-day forecast for the Sacramento Valley. The lack of rain thus far has made it difficult to proceed with N fertilizer topdress applications in non-irrigated wheat fields this season. In addition, the warmer than normal temperatures have increased the rate of crop development such that many fall planted wheat crops are further along than would normally be the case at this time of year. Figures 1 and 2 below represent the cumulative rainfall since 10/1/2017 and the cumulative growing degree days (GDD) for wheat since 11/21/17, when we planted our experimental trials in Davis (each is compared to a 10-year...
