Learn about wheat, legume breeding at Spillman field day

Visitors tour crops at the Spillman Field Day
Visitors learn about research crops at the Spillman Agronomy Farm annual field day.

Join Washington State University for the 2015 Spillman Agronomy Farm field day, Tuesday, July 14, at the Spillman Agronomy Farm in Pullman.

Registration begins at 7:30 a.m. and field tours will begin at 8 a.m. This event is free and open to the public.

This event will include presentations led by WSU and USDA-ARS researchers on wheat and legume breeding programs, light refreshments throughout the day, and a catered lunch program at noon. The lunch program will feature Dr. Randy Fortenbery, professor and Small Grains Endowed Chair in the WSU School of Economic Sciences.

The field presentations will include:

• Targeted Wheat Improvement – Dr. Kulvinder Gill

• Targeted wheat improvement in the development of two-gene Clearfield wheat lines and improving heat tolerance.

• Breeding Barley for Feed, Food, and Malt – Dr. Kevin Murphy

• View new and up-and-coming barley varieties and discuss breeding barley for high lysine content and herbicide tolerance.

• Spring Wheat Breeding Program – Dr. Mike Pumphrey

• Discussion of Washington spring wheat varieties, elite variety candidates, and spring wheat breeding program nurseries.

• Grain Legume Breeding – Dr. Rebecca McGee, Dr. George Vandemark

• Discussion of new spring legume varieties and how breeding programs focus on disease and insect resistance

• Grain Legume Disease and Agronomy – Dr. Weidong Chen, Dr. Stephen Guy

• Emerging disease issues in chickpea and other grain legumes and seeding rate and low pH management practices.

• Winter Wheat Breeding – Arron Carter

• Winter wheat breeding programs and discussions of new cultivars, prevalent wheat diseases, and new screening techniques.

• Stripe Rust – Xianming Chen

• Development in experimental plots, rust situations, fungicide management, and research progress.

Spillman Agronomy Farm is located two miles southeast of WSU at 1452 Johnson Rd. Washington and Idaho pesticide credit and Certified Crop Advisor continuing education unit applications are pending.

The Spillman Field Day is a biannual event. The next scheduled field day will be during the summer of 2017.