SPG variety selection tool will help farmers to make more informed decisions

Farmers now have a new tool when it comes to selecting pulse crop varieties

The Saskatchewan Pulse Growers launching it's pulse regional variety trial portal this week.

SPG's Director of Research and Development Sherrilyn Phelps says they've been working on the new portal for over a year now and are excited to see it available.

The site provides regional variety trial (RVT) data covering up to twelve years of pulse variety data which will help growers make more informed decisions.

Phelps says the portal is really set up to allow growers to go on and see how varieties perform in their area, under their conditions, under certain years.  

"So, they can choose years where maybe it was drier.  They want to look at it under drier conditions, they want to compare a couple varieties. It really gives them that tool to dive a little deeper on how those varieties perform in their area versus just the aggregated data over all the sites and all the years."

Through the Variety Release Program, SPG has developed over 120 pulse varieties available to growers, royalty-free as part of a 15-year breeding agreement with the Crop Development Centre at the University of Saskatchewan. 

Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada and other private companies have released additional pulse varieties.