By Addison DeHaven
The South Dakota State University Agricultural Experiment Station and the South Dakota State Foundation Seed Stock Division is releasing a new hulled oat cultivar and a hard spring red wheat cultivar to certified seed growers.
"South Dakota State University understands that the development of new wheat and oat varieties is vital to ensuring the economic sustainability of farmers in South Dakota and the Upper Midwest," said John Blanton, associate dean for research for the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences and the director of the South Dakota Agricultural Experiment Station. "We are proud to release two new varieties that embody our commitment to agricultural innovation. These varieties represent years of dedicated research collaboration, and we hope they contribute to improved productivity, resilience, and profitability for our customers and stakeholders."
SDSU's plant breeding programs — including oats, winter and spring wheats — are designed to increase the profitability of farmers in South Dakota and surrounding states by developing and releasing new cultivars. SDSU's cultivars are widely used by farmers in South Dakota. For example, around 75% of hard red spring wheat acres in South Dakota are sown to cultivars developed by SDSU's hard red spring wheat breeding program.
The cultivars are developed over a number of years at different sites, including SDSU's experiment station farms and rented land. They are tested in crop performance testing trials in different soils and moisture conditions. The SDSU Variety Release Committee, composed of producers, researchers and administrators, reviews data from the trials and decides whether to increase the number of seeds with the intent on releasing the cultivar for future sale or discontinuing it.
Oat cultivar
"SD Ranger" is a white hulled oat cultivar derived from a spring 2017 greenhouse cross of SD150160/SD150081. It was released due to its gain yield and excellent test weight. SD Ranger is resistant to smut, moderately resistant to moderately susceptible to crown rust, and moderately tolerant to barely yellow dwarf virus.
Melanie Caffe, associate professor in the Department of Agronomy, Horticulture and Plant Science, leads SDSU's oat breeding program and carries out various research projects related to oat improvement.
"SD Ranger is a good replacement for Rushmore with similar test weight and plump seed but with higher grain yield potential," Caffe said. "SD Ranger is among the varieties approved by the milling industry."
Over the course of a three-year evaluation, SD Ranger finished second for grain yield (behind CDC Endure) and third for test weight. It exhibited an average thousand kernel weight of 35.8 g.
Seed increase and purification of SD Ranger was initiated in 2021.
An application will be submitted for a U.S. Plant Variety Protection.
Wheat cultivar
"Enhance-SD" is a hard red spring wheat cultivar from a fall 2014 hybridization of SDS4576 and Prevail in the SDSU spring wheat breeding program. Important points associated with Enhance-SD include: high yield potential, above average test weight, above average grain protein concentration, moderate resistance to Fusarium head blight and Bacterial leaf streak, and average to above average end-use quality performance.
Karl Glover, professor in the Department of Agronomy, Horticulture and Plant Science, leads SDSU's hard red spring wheat breeding program and is a member of SDSU's Variety Release Committee.
"Over the past five years of its development, we’ve noted that Enhance-SD seems best suited to the northern areas of spring wheat production in South Dakota," Glover said. "I am always happy to release a new variety, and I believe growers situated north of Highway 14 will find Enhance-SD to be very competitive in terms of grain yield production, protein content, and disease resistance."
End-use quality tests carried out at the USDA Hard Red Spring Wheat Quality Laboratory and Northern Crops Institute in Fargo, North Dakota, demonstrated that most milling and baking quality parameters associated with Enhance-SD were generally similar to or better than those of several contemporary commercially available cultivars.
An application will be submitted for a U.S. Plant Variety Protection.
South Dakota State Foundation Seed Stock
Organized in 1944 and incorporated in 1945, the South Dakota State Foundation Seed Stock Division is a nonprofit corporation made to increase and distribute agronomically superior varieties of seed and propagating materials from the South Dakota Agricultural Experiment Station, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service and other agriculture experiment stations for the benefit of South Dakota agriculture and the citizens of this state. In addition, the division provides storage for reserve of pure seed stock materials.
The operation is financed through the sale of seed and helps fund the continued development of new cultivars.
Source : sdstate.edu