The last day of April saw the sun split the stones. With temperatures hitting 24°C, an inevitable question for the day that was in it was “is it too hot to spray?”

The answer was it wasn’t too hot to spray and isn’t it a great change from two weeks’ ago when James O’Loughlin was driving over the Wicklow Gap in the snow concerned about the impact of frost on growth regulation on crops.

James is an agronomist with Quinns Baltinglass in north Kildare, east Wicklow and he dips into counties Meath and Dublin as well.

Our focus last Wednesday was the Garden of Ireland where we saw oilseed rape in full bloom, winter beans in flower, winter wheat heading for flag leaf and spring barley jumping out of the ground.

Oilseed rape

Throughout the day we saw a number of crops of Armada winter oilseed rape, some sown in August and in mid-September. The September crops were not yet at full flower, but all crops were impressive.

One crop planted on 15 August was over 6ft, even with two applications of Caryx for growth regulation. Its height didn’t take away from its thickness.

The crop was due an application of Shepherd at 0.8l/ha in the following days. James also plans to apply Oilseed Extra at pod fill to help yield. This is a foliar nitrogen product with 8 units of N and trace elements. It will be applied at 200l/ha.

Another crop was exceeding expectations. Six weeks ago, it was worse for wear after a bad grazing by pigeons, but after an application of Korvetto herbicide and nitrogen, it has filled out well and looked to have good potential.

Winter beans

We visited an impressive crop of winter beans in Powerscourt. Although they were actually Caprice spring beans, planted on the 6 October.

Beans have been introduced to the rotation in the Powerscourt Estate as part of their sustainability programme to reduce their artificial nitrogen fertiliser demand and to increase the flowering area for native pollinators.

Despite their woodland surroundings, they had survived the crows and the frost and establishment was excellent and even. They received Nirvana and Kerb Flo at planting.

The field has annual meadow grass and broad-leaved weeds. In the spring time it received 150kg/ac of 0-5-25.

Three weeks earlier it had received Signum at 0.6kg/ha and another application of Signum was prescribed last week, along with Thiopron at 2l/ha to help with Downy Mildew control.

Chocolate spot was evident in the plant, but levels were not overly high, especially in the top of the plant.

Elatus Era may be applied later in the season, if needed.

Crops of spring beans were getting big in the fields. There was very little notching from bean weevil to report.

An odd field will receive a graminicide where needed for grass or volunteer cereals. Centurion Max will likely be applied.

“Beans have established well. They got a great chance to go in, unlike last year. They went in in good order. Pre-emergence herbicides have worked well in most places,” James commented.

He also noted: “Beans are a very important part of the rotation and they do add a lot to first cereal yield so we’re big supporters of the spring bean.”

Spring barley

Fields of Planet spring barley beside those winter beans were looking happy in the fine weather in Powerscourt.

At 114 units of N/ac, the sunshine was doing the crop good. Herbicide was to be applied last week: Galaxy at 0.75l/ha, Cameo at 45g/ha, Axial pro at 0.6l/ha and Novofour, which contains manganese, boron, zinc and copper. On some more advanced crops James is adding in a fungicide.

More spring barley in north Kildare had low levels of weeds in the crop and as recent rain had driven weeds up in most crops, it looked like the barley would meet in the rows fairly quickly to block out light to any latecomers.

With no obvious nutrient deficiencies detected, James was going to advise holding off on the herbicide for a few days to allow some more weeds to germinate and maybe add in some fungicide on the day of travel.

Winter wheat

We visited a number of different crops of Champion and Graham winter wheat at different growth stages.

Rust had been an issue early on, but T0s looked to have done their job in controlling the disease. An odd bit was visible in some crops, though, as has been reported in other parts of the country.

Mildew was also present in a number of fields, mainly in the base of the plant and while not a big worry on yield, James noted it was safer to make sure it was knocked down so he added Midas to the tank.

This crop received Comet, Novofour and Ceraide on 11 April and James advised a T1 fungicide application of Revystar at 1.5l/ha, Mirror (folpet) at 1.5l/ha, Midas for mildew at 0.25l/ha and growth regulation of Medax Max at 0.3kg/ha and CeCeCe at 1l/ha.

A crop of Champion in Newcastle which had been knocked back a little bit by herbicide in the spring time was looking well and back on track. Leaf three was out and it was about to receive its first growth regulator of Medax Max, along with Revystar and Mirror.

A crop of Graham in Newtown Mount Kennedy, planted on 6 October had leaf two nearly out and it had received Questar and Proteb at T1.

Looking ahead to T2s, James said: “We do have a great product in Inatreq for septoria and in more cases we’re probably going to leave that until T2 on the flag leaf.

“At the moment the way disease has turned out we’re probably going to leave that in the back pocket.

“There have been cases of earlier sown crops in high disease pressure situations where we decided to go with Questar [Inatreq] at T1 to try and keep a bit of persistency out to T2.

“It has been a mixed approach and Questar or in whatever form the Inatreq active is going to be a key tool in keeping septoria at bay.”

You can listen to James on the Tillage Podcast by scanning this QR code.