For the first time this year there is a substantial amount of the sugar beet crop drilled down to rhizomania resistant varieties.
Not only do these varieties account for approx 20% of the seed drilled nationally but in some areas in Norfolk and Suffolk
there is up to 80% of the area in rhizo resistant seed. The rapid uptake by British farmers shows that they have not lost their
ability to spot a good thing when they see it. Indeed many large professional beet farmers would now simply not take the
risk of going back to drilling the old fashioned susceptible varieties.
Just as rhizomania is spreading out from Norfolk and Suffolk into Lincolnshire there is thankfully a solution. British Sugar's strategy of containing the early outbreaks was successful in slowing the spread of the disease giving time for the new breakthroughs in breeding to be commercially proven. Major advances in breeding mean that Rhizo resistant varieties now yield as much as susceptible varieties, have excellent agronomic characters and do not cost any more. The resistant variety Mars even has the top sugar yield on the 2006 NIAB list and unsurprisingly accounts for 9% nationally of the 2006 crop.
With a major part of the beet crop drilled in the Bury factory area, farmers with these varieties such as Bobcat and Harry can at least sleep easily that their yields are secure. In Lincolnshire however the weather delayed such an early start and there is still a lot to do as you move north through the county. With later drillings, particularly if there is now warmer weather and frequent showers in the next few weeks, we could well see an increase in the number of new outbreaks. If you are not growing rhizomania resistant varieties do keep a very close eye on your crop in July and August. – Initially outbreaks are normally restricted into patches and once established and spread by cultivations throughout the field yield losses of up to 70% can occur in future crops.
Tony Guthrie of Elsoms Seeds commented "Why take the risk of getting rhizomania when there is now nothing to lose and everything to gain? Drilling a conventional variety is like betting on a three legged horse when you can now have a resistant variety for the same price. Rhizo resistant varieties are now the standard for the UK market because they also help to slow down the spread of the virus. In 3 years time I anticipate that a major part of the crop will be sown to Rhizomania resistant varieties."
