High-yielding, low-input oilseed rape varieties suitable for an integrated farm management approach are the aim of breeder DSV’s triple layer concept, which was unveiled at Cereals 2018.

The new concept will form the basis of the company’s future breeding strategy, as it concentrates on producing varieties with the yield and performance stability growers will increasingly need to overcome complex challenges.

See also: Advice on achieving high OSR yields with good establishment

Those include restrictions on pesticide and fertiliser use, climate change and seasonal stresses, said DSV’s Alex Doering, who added triple layering will be combined with the company’s existing variety characteristics of strong early vigour, good compensation powers and open plant architecture.

“Having developed these characteristics in our post-neonicotinoid breeding initiative, we are now bringing in additional layers of disease resistance and yield protection traits,” he said.

“It should allow us to develop a ‘drill and forget’ production system for oilseed rape, so that costly agronomic intervention becomes a thing of the past,” Dr Doering added.

Triple layer

The term triple layer refers to a combination of disease resistance trait and physical characters found in the company’s latest development hybrid varieties – all three of which are under test in the UK and expected to become candidates later this year (see ‘Triple layer varieties’, below).

If successful, they are likely to be the first commercially available varieties to combine all of these traits.

The first layer is multi-gene resistant to phoma and light leaf spot, while the second and third layers bring in verticillium wilt tolerance and pod shatter resistance.

“It allows the varieties to be grown with fewer inputs and in a range of conditions, making them easy to manage and giving consistent results,” added Dr Doering.

The company is also working on turnip yellow virus resistance, with a portfolio of resistant varieties showing good yield stability in a number of European countries.

In addition, it is hoping to develop the first multi-layered Clearfield variety and has clubroot-resistant varieties in the pipeline.