CONTRACT BETWEEN
MONTANA AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION
RESEARCH CENTERS
and
MONTANA WHEAT AND BARLEY COMMITTEE

Title: Assessing agronomic practices to advance cereal production in Montana

Time Period: Jan 1, 2021 to Dec 31, 2021

Personnel:

Kent A McVay, Extension Crop Scientist & Coordinator at the Southern Agricultural Research Center

Peggy Lamb, Crop Scientist at the Northern Agricultural Research Center

Jed Eberly, Soil Microbiologist at the Central Agricultural Research Center

Chengci Chen, Superintendent/Crop Scientist at the Eastern Agricultural Research Center

Clint Beiermann, Cropping Systems Agronomist at the Northwestern Agricultural Research Center

Justin Vetch, Superintendent/Crop Scientist at the Western Triangle Agricultural Research Center

Cooperators:

Reserach Scientists, Research Associates, Assistants, Technicians and Farm Managers at each research center. County Extension agents, and cooperating producers hosting off-station research trials on farms across Montana.

Objecives:

1. Evaluate the effects of differing systems on crop and variety performance under diverse environments represented across the state of Montana.
2. Evaluate the potential fit of other materials, concepts and techniques with various cropping systems employed for cereal crop production.

Background and Justification

Montana agricultural producers are always looking for the development and implementation of new and/or refined materials and methods for enhanced economic efficiency in cereal crop production. This project is designed to provide answers on these issues to producers across the many regions of the state.

Projects

1. Cropping System Investigations
   1. Spring grain performance following various cover crop mixes in southcentral Montana – SARC
2. Cereal Variety Performance Evaluations
   1. Hard Red & White Winter Wheat Trials
      1. Southcentral Montana off-station winter wheat variety performance evaluations – SARC
      2. Dryland winter wheat variety performance trials in eastern Montana – EARC
      3. Off-station winter wheat variety trial – NWARC
      4. Northcentral Montana off-station winter wheat cultivar performance evaluations – NARC
      5. Off-Station winter wheat variety performance trials in central Montana – CARC
   2. Hard Red & White Spring Wheat Trials
      1. Southcentral Montana off-station spring wheat variety performance evaluations – SARC
      2. Evaluation of spring wheat varieties under dryland conditions at three locations in eastern Montana – EARC
      3. Off-station spring wheat variety trial in northwest Montana – NWARC
      4. Northcentral Montana off-station spring wheat cultivar performance evaluations – NARC
      5. Off-station spring wheat variety performance trials in central Montana – CARC
      6. Off-station spring wheat cultivar evaluations for the Western Golden Triangle area of Montana – WTARC
   3. Soft White Wheat Trials (none this year)
   4. Durum Trials
      1. Northcentral Montana off-station spring durum cultivar performance evaluations – NARC
      2. Evaluation of durum varieties under dryland conditions at three locations – EARC
   5. Spring Barley Trials
      1. Southcentral Montana spring barley variety performance evaluations – SARC
      2. Dryland spring barley variety performance in eastern Montana – EARC
      3. Off-station spring barley variety trials in northwest Montana – NWARC
      4. Off-station barley variety performance trials in central Montana – CARC
      5. Off-station spring barley cultivar evaluations for the Western Golden Triangle area of Montana – WTARC
3. Alternative Crop Management (none this year)
4. Crop Nutrient Management
   1. Winter wheat nitrogen managmenet – NWARC
   2. Off-station spring wheat acid soil performance evaluation – WTARC
   3. Off-station spring barley acid soil performance evaluation – WTARC
5. Disease Management (none this year)
6. Insect Management (none this year)
7. Weed Managment (none this year)
8. Other Studies (none this year)

Procedures

All projects are replicated either three or four times in randomized designs appropriate to each location. All reported grain yields and protein are corrected to a uniform moisture level as reported in the results table for each project. Grain moisture, test weight, and protein are typically measured using Dickey-John grain analysis computers and NIR technology.

Application and Results

Results are available to the Montana crop producer as well as to the scientific community. All results from these investigations will be available by request and can be found on the web at the Southern Agricultural Research Center website (http://www.sarc.montana.edu/ ) as well as at the Montana Wheat and Barley Committee website (http://wbc.agr.mt.gov/).

Current or Pending Budgetary Support

All projects included herein are partially supported by MAES funding to include scientist salaries. Projects included herein are not supported by other grants.

Potential for Enhanced Extramural Funding

Extramural support for research on variety evaluations is difficult to obtain. By funding this project MWBC helps us build long-term evaluations over multiple environments. The resultant data sets and documented trends can then be used to justify more elaborate grant proposals that can gain attraction from other funding sources.