Drought and Irrigated wheat variety decisions

We have recommended irrigated wheat varieties in the wheat variety decision tree that is in our extension newsletter issue on wheat, on two web pages, and part of the new issue of the Wheat Grower that is sent to several thousand wheat producers.

Agents can go to wheat.colostate.edu and:

1. Access the 2001 decision tree (from the variety database page). These are our most current "recommendations" relative to which varieties are best suited for either irrigated or dryland.

 
2. Query the database for irrigation-specific wheat variety trial info, either from the single location data summaries, the multiple location data summaries page, or the head-to-head comparisons page. All of the 2002 data are in the single location and head-to-head databases, but they have not been included in the multiple location summaries database.

Also note that there is an IP contract program run by AgriPro and ConAgra to produce the white wheat variety, Platte under contract. They pay bonus for protein content and I am guessing but think it would run 15-25 cents per bushel. Platte is a sound high yielding white wheat variety that will stand higher inputs for yields of 100-120 bu/ac. Interested growers need to contact the nearest AgriPro seed dealer to get into the program. With the protein bonus, Platte is the economic variety of choice. It is susceptible to stripe rust (like many others) and got hit hard in 2001 by the stripe rust epidemic but that is considered by most to be a very infrequent problem.