Ungarie - Vetch Variety Trials

Sharon Taylor, Central West Farming Systems (CWFS)

Take Home Messages:

Challus lathyrus produced hay which was more nutritious than vetch and field peas.
Out of the commercial vetch varieties and the SARDI breeding line, Haymaker produced the most nutritious hay, however it has greater than 5% hard seeds.
The best alternative commercial vetch variety, to Haymaker, was Morava as it has no hard seeds
The SARDI breeding lines that performed the closest to Haymaker were SA/34433 and SA/33600

Introduction

Vetches are a versatile annual winter growing legume. They can be used for grain production, green manuring, hay, silage and as a pasture substitute. Matic & Nagel (2001) found vetch hay to be richer in protein than all cereals, medics and even lucerne (2001). The ability of vetch to adapt to a wide range of soil types and rainfall areas has allowed it to become a valuable crop in cereal rotations. The rotational benefits of vetch include nitrogen fixation, a disease break and easier grass control due to a wide range of herbicides (McMurray & Matic 2002; Seymour et al. 2000).

The Ungarie regional site group wanted to conduct a vetch variety trial to look for a dual purpose vetch variety. Due to the issues surrounding hard seeded varieties (i.e. not all seeds germinate in the first season, creating volunteers in following crops) it was decided that we would prevent the vetches from setting seed, so subsequently we cut the varieties for hay and sprayed out the remaining stand.

The aims of the trial were to compare the quality of hay produced from Morgan field pea, Challus lathyrus and vetch. Challus lathyrus is a winter-growing annual grain legume with a similar growth habit to field peas (Hanbury & Siddique 1998). Another aim was to compare the quality of hay produced from commercial vetch varieties compared with the South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI) breeding lines.

The breeding lines obtained from SARDI were a part of a GRDC-funded vetch breeding program to develop high yielding, disease resistant and low toxin vetch varieties. Subsequently the SARDI lines (coded: SA/) contained in this trial included a mixture of vetches for grain production and vetches for pasture, hay and green manure production. The different lines, where applicable, have been grouped.

Method

The trial was designed as a randomized block design with each variety replicated three times. The trial was sown into a paddock which had wheat in 2000 and 2001 with a grazed-out lupin crop in 2002. It was dry sown on the 28th May 2003, with 80 kg/ha Starter Fos, using a trial plot seeder with narrow points and press wheels, with the plots 15 m long and 1.75 m wide. The herbicides used prior to sowing, on the 28th May, were Roundup Power Max @ 1 L/ha and Treflan @ 1.2 L/ha. The rainfall for 2003 can be seen in Figure 1. The trial began germinating during June with a slow growth until better rain fell in July/August.

On the 29th September 2003, dry matter cuts were taken and the remaining stands of vetch were sprayed out to prevent seed set. The vetch samples were placed in a dehydrator for 3 days at 58oC at the Condobolin Agricultural Research and Advisory Station. Once dried the samples were weighed and ground to pass through a 1 mm sieve and sent to FeedTest® in Hamilton, Victoria. They analysed the following:

Crude protein (% dry weight) - the amount of true protein and non-protein nitrogen.
Dry matter digestibility (% digestible dry matter) - an estimate of the percentage of dry matter actually digested by animals.
Metabolisable energy (MJ/kg DM) - the feed energy used by the animal, calculated from digestible dry matter.
Neutral detergent fibre (% of dry matter) - the percentage of total cell wall material or plant structure in a feed. Normally the lower the NDF, the more the animal will eat.
Residual dry matter (%)

Results and Discussion

The dry weight and feed analysis results for the Morgan field peas, Challus lathyrus and vetch are shown in Table 1. These results show a significant difference between the three crops. Morgan field peas had the highest dry weight and neutral detergent fibre, whilst Morgan field peas and vetch had the highest residual dry matter.

The most nutritious hay was produced by Challus lathyrus. It had the highest levels of crude protein, dry matter digestibility and metabolisable energy, whilst the lowest level of neutral detergent fibre. Challus lathyrus also had one of the lowest dry weights (t/ha), which was not significantly different from vetch. Hanbury and Siddique (1998) reported that Challus lathyrus had slow growth in winter producing relatively little feed. They recommended if using Challus lathyrus for grazing livestock then to do so in late winter and early spring.

Table 1. The average dry weight and feed analysis results for Morgan field peas, Challus lathyrus and vetch. Note: Numbers with the same letter are not significantly different.

The dry weight and feed analysis results for the commercial vetch varieties and the SARDI breeding lines are shown in Table 2. These results show a significant difference between the vetch varieties. Haymaker had a significantly lower dry weight and neutral detergent fibre but a significantly higher digestibility and metabolisable energy. The greatest concern with Haymaker is its level of hardseeds, >5%. Therefore the next best commercial variety is Morava, as it has no hard seeds, is versatile in end use and is resistant to rust and ascochyta (Seymour et al. 2000).

Two SARDI varieties performed closely to Haymaker, they were SA/34433 and SA/33600. SA/34433 has a high potential for grain production and a moderate potential for hay. The draw back with this variety is that it has a high shattering percentage and an unknown level of hard seeds (Matic personal communication 2003). SA/33600 has a high grain potential but a low hay potential. It has < 2% hard seed and > 15% shattering and is very susceptible to rust and ascochyta (Matic personal communication 2003).

Table 2. Average feed analysis results for the vetch varieties. Hard seeded percentages are also given. Note: * means the particular vetch line has a high potential as a hay crop, ** means a moderate potential as a hay crop.

Conclusion

In conclusion the most nutrition hay was produced by Challus lathyrus when compared with vetch and Morgan field peas. Out of the vetch varieties Haymaker, even though it produces less hay, produced the best quality hay, however it has >5% hard seeds. Morava was the best commercial equal to Haymaker and SA/34433 and SA/33600 were the best breeding lines, from SARDI, equal to Haymaker.

Acknowledgments

On behalf of CWFS and the Ungarie Regional Site, I would like to thank Peter Gordon for offering to have the vetch variety trial located on his property and for providing his help and advice during the growing season. I would also like to thank Rade Matic, Vetch Breeder at SARDI, for providing us with seed and information about each of the vetch varieties. We understand that the seed supply for trials in 2003 was limited and we greatly appreciated being able to have access to some of that seed.

We would also like to thank Allan L'Estrange and Nathan Border for their help with the vetch variety trial. Thank you also goes to our major sponsors the Grain Growers Association and GRDC.

References

Hanbury, C., and Siddique, K. (1998) Farmnote 24/98 - Growing dwarf chickling (Lathyrus cicera). Western Australia Department of Agriculture, South Perth.

Matic, R. and Nagel, S. (2001) Vetch Breeding Annual Report 2001. South Australian Research and Development Institute, Adelaide SA.

McMurray, L. and Matic, R. (2002) Fact Sheet - Vetch variety sowing guide for 2003. South Australian Research and Development Institute, Adelaide SA.

Seymour, M., Siddique, K., Pritchard, I., Brandon, N., Riethmuller, G. and Latham, L. (2000) Common Vetch Production Technology Bulletin 4444. Chief Executive Officer, Department of Agriculture, Western Australia.