Pulse Agronomy Trials

Collaborating with Brill Ag, Grain Orana Alliance and Frontier Farming systems, with funding from GRDC.

The project aims to get a better understanding of the adaptability of pulse species to the local environments and how to improve production and close the yield gap of the best adapted pulses. The project is now in its 3rd year.

The project includes 2 major validation (hub) sites at Ganmain and Parkes, delivering a series of fully replicated trial designs to measure the yield gap, and 5 on farm demonstration (spoke) trial sites. Our site at Barellan is one of the 5 spoke sites for the project, along with sites at Gol Gol, Canowindra, Caragabal and Buraja focussing on on-farm paddock scale strip trials, and/or small
demonstration plot trials driven by local grower D&E priorities.

The focus of the Barellan site in 2023 is to:
1. Evaluate the relative performance of major pulse crops (faba beans, field peas, lentils, lupins, vetch) in a variable rainfall environment.
2. Compare the effectiveness of nitrogen fixation in pulses grown in soils with a high base N level and determine if any pulse species is better than others at maintaining N fixed when sown into high nitrogen paddocks in a variable rainfall environment.
3. Determine if the crop root factors used (1.5 for beans, lentils, lupins, vetch and field peas and 2 for chickpeas) when calculating total nitrogen fixation is applicable in our variable rainfall environment.