Ungrazed winter canola, specifically the hybrid RGT Nizza CL, has earned its place as a profitable crop on Ben Findlay’s farm near Weatherboard, Victoria, because its flowering window suits his climate.

“Generally, spring canola varieties flower too early for our chosen sowing window and other winter canola varieties flower too late for our environment,” he says. “RGT Nizza CL is one of the earliest flowering winter varieties available.”

He finds the winter varieties are about half a tonne per hectare higher yielding than the spring varieties for his area.

He sows the variety from late March to early April. After applying a double knock for weeds, he targets 30 plants per square metre (about 1.8 kilograms of seed/ha) and  plants as shallow as possible, applying  100kg/ha of monoammonium phosphate with the seed.

Heavy wheat stubbles are burnt before sowing. He uses a homemade 9m tyned and press wheel seeder set on 254-millimetre  (10-inch) row spacings.

To boost soil phosphorous and potassium levels, he spreads 150kg/ha of single super and 100kg/ha of potash ahead of the seeder.

Pre-emergent treatments include trifluralin (Treflan^®), propyzamide (Kerb^®) and clopyralid (Lontrel^®). Post-emergence products include s-metolachlor (Dual Gold^®), clethodim (Select^®) and imazamox + imazapyr (Intervix^®).

Slug issues

Slugs are a perennial problem and Ben usually applies up to four bait treatments. “Season 2023 was strange because areas that are normally hotspots for slugs didn’t have many, and the areas usually free of slugs needed a lot of baiting,” he says.

“The slugs were mostly found on our red rather than grey soils. Maybe the grey soils were too wet, while the moisture on the red soils was about right.

“We were monitoring the areas that were normally hotspots and ignoring the areas that weren’t, which led to damage  and some resowing.”

Ben varies urea rates between 300kg/ha and 500kg/ha, depending on seasonal conditions.

Normally, he applies two doses of fungicide in September; however, in 2023, he applied one dose of fludioxonil + pydiflumetofen (Miravis® Star) at the 20 per cent bloom stage because conditions had turned dry in August. In hindsight, he feels he could have eliminated this application.

In 2023, Ben tried windrowing on 30 November, but the crop was too green.  So, he came back a week later.

When harvested, the RGT Nizza CL canola averaged about 4t/ha. His spring canola brought the average of his canola harvest down to 3.7t/ha. The oil was more than 42 per cent. His canola crops generally average 3.5 to 4t/ha.

In 2023, some of Ben’s canola was sold to Windermere Oilseeds for about $680/t, with the remainder held on-farm in sealed silos before delivery to Melbourne.

He says there is a real benefit to having a canola variety that flowers in the window appropriate to his relatively high rainfall and long growing conditions.

“We have grown 5t/ha canola in one paddock, but if we get the right variety and management, I think 6t/ha for canola yield averaged across the farm is possible.”

Lessons learned

In 2022, Ben’s participation in GRDC’s Hyper Yielding Crops awards showed he could grow 10.6t/ha of RGT Cesario on average, in one paddock. However, he now prefers the long-season wheats BigRed and Longford because these varieties  are higher yielding and more tolerant to disease.

Ben says his average wheat yields in 2023 were disappointing because most of the rain that fell was received in the first part of the season, followed by a cold winter and a dry spring. The wheat yielded 4.2t/ha on average, down from a long-term average of about 7t/ha.

He says being prepared and diligent with management timing is crucial for growing high yields. “We inspect our crops regularly and are prepared to proactively apply whatever inputs are needed, particularly fungicides,” he says.

“Although we have a small farm, we have a self-propelled sprayer to ensure we can apply treatments when required because our spray window is so small.”

More information: Ben Findlay, ben@ozvalueag.com.au

Useful resources: view the National Variety Trials website.