Jared Sampson bulked up 16 hectares of InterGrain’s Vixen wheat this season on his family’s Waramboo, Eyre Peninsula, South Australia farm.
A Grain Producers SA Director, he returned to the family farm in 2012 after a career in agribusiness.
So wrapped was he in Vixen’s 2.3 tonne per hectare yield, which was up to nine per cent higher than his adjacent Scepter crop, he has retained 25 tonne for bulking up again next year.
He intends on planting 400ha next year and if Vixen again performs well, which Jared expects it will, he anticipates half of his 2021 wheat program will be Vixen.
“It has potential to be a very popular variety in our district, as it has attracted a lot of interest after its performance this year,” he said.
He described harvest as relatively stress free, due to a good run with harvesting conditions and the opening of additional receival points.
“Vixen appears to have a better stubble loading than Scepter, perhaps due to the soil type it was grown on, but either way it showed that its moderate plant height helps,” Jared said.
His Vixen crop was sown on May 21, with 50kg of DAP and no further fertilising during the growing season.
“It germinated in about a week and then really got going, flowering on September 3, about five days earlier than our Scepter crop,” Jared noted.
Growing season rainfall was 200mm, which included a 50mm season improving fall on September 20.
He looks forward to planting Vixen next year on some frost prone heavier country.
“We’ll see how it stacks up there, as this year it was no more affected by frost than any of the other varieties we grew,” he said.
Bred by InterGrain’s Dr Dan Mullan, Vixen offers a true varietal opportunity to include within wheat programs to assist in spreading flowering windows during critical spring stress periods.
In addition to the variety’s stand-out yield performance, it offers good stripe (MRMS) and stem (MRMS) rust and yellow leaf spot (MRMS) resistance.
Vixen has strong physical grain characteristics, with good grain size and hectolitre weight and also short plant height, which may assist stubble management in high yielding crops.
