HGCA‘s appropriate fungicide dose trials will undergo a significant revamp in the coming season, Vicky Foster, senior research manager for the levy board said.

Out will go the single GS33 timing that has drawn criticism for being not realistic to commercial practice. Instead there will be now applications at T1 and T2 only to show protective and eradicant performance, and a T1 and T2 programme for a “reality check” and more realistic yield data, Ms Foster said.

The project – now called ‘Fungicide performance on winter wheat’ will test new actives alongside three standards – epoxiconazole, prothioconazole and chlorothalonil.

Another development will be to evaluate fungicide performance at one-third doses on a restricted range of varieties in the Recommended List trials, while those trials will also be used for the Crop Monitor project where appropriate, she said.