Unharvested cereals breaking down and hit by moulds and sprouting
Some crops of spring barley were breaking down, and sooty moulds were increasing on all crops, said Teagasc tillage specialists last week.
Some wheat varieties had started to sprout. Growers were advised by Teagasc to prioritise varieties prone to sprouting, for harvesting.
Advisors said yields so far had been reasonably good, but winter barley had been disappointing (linked to problems such as take-all, and poor control of late season disease, or of barley yellow dwarf virus, which can cause yield losses of up to three tonnes per hectare).
Grain quality has been generally good.
Yields and quality of malting barley had been good so far, with no skinning issues, but grain protein tending towards less than desired suitability for the distilling market.
Teagasc’s provisional national cereal harvest estimate last week was 2.1m tonnes, a slight decrease from 2016, mostly due to the acreage reduction of 5.2%.
Teagasc said grain prices remained depressed due to supply exceeding demand, and high worldwide stocks of small grains and maize.
IFA National Grain Committee Chairman Liam Dunne has said that difficult weather conditions will compound the income crisis many tillage farmers are facing due to a fourth season of low prices and inevitable crop losses.
He said last week only 40% of spring barley had been harvested to date in the early sown areas, and a very significant portion of the winter wheat crop remained to be cut.
Irish cereal sowings have fallen by 52,000 hectares since 2012, and Mr Dunne said this trend will continue unless there is a dramatic turnaround in grain prices and growers’ incomes.
