Alberta’s RVT Program Provides An Unbiased Research Voice

by | Apr 18, 2022

The regional variety trials (RVT) program provides Alberta farmers with impartial data on crop varieties.

Growing a crop in Alberta can be influenced by many different factors, and depending on where you plant it in the province can make all the difference. For farmers looking to plant new varieties, there can be hesitation about the unknown, which is where the regional variety trials (RVT) program fits in.

The RVT program has been running for decades in order to provide farmers in the province with an unbiased review of how crop varieties perform in the province. Trial co-operators across the province plant trial plots of cereal, oilseed, pulse and silage varieties every growing season. They collect data on them which is then compiled and published in the spring issue of the Alberta Seed Guide.

While the trials have always been a collaborative effort, that collaboration has taken on a whole new meaning in recent years. In 2020, producer groups across Alberta found out the provincial government would be letting go the RVT program coordinator as part of the province’s decision to move agricultural research work into the hands of growers.

The RVT program for 2020 was still run by the provincial program coordinator with producer groups taking over the 2021 season. Some groups did already partly run the RVT programs themselves such as the canola growers. The Alberta Pulse Growers (APG) had started taking a more active role in the RVT trials for pulse crops in 2018.

“It has afforded us this bit of a mentorship over the last couple years. And then, because of that really close connection, it also allowed us to do a little bit of risk mitigation,” Jenn Walker, research and extension manager for APG, explains in a phone interview. “The biggest change on our part is Alberta Agriculture used to handle building all of the tables for the seed guide. And so that has been a huge learning curve for us to take on.”

Sheri Strydhorst

Sheri Strydhorst is now an agronomy research specialist with Alberta Wheat and Barley commissions. Photo: Megan Evans of Alberta Wheat and Barley commissions

The Alberta Wheat and Barley commissions created a new position in order to handle the cereals and flax RVT trials which they are now in charge of. In early 2021, Sheri Strydhorst was hired as the agronomy research specialist and RVT coordinator for the organizations.

Applied research associations in the province, including Chinook Applied Research Association, collaborate on handling the silage RVT program. The associations are still learning the ropes and plans to review their process once the 2021 trials are wrapped up.

“We’ve kind of taken turns coordinating, and (the provincial RVT program coordinator) fortunately, was able to do the field books and roll up the data for us. So it’s been an adjustment losing that support, and we’re just kind of working out how that’s going to be better moving forward,” Dianne Westerlund, manager of CARA, says in a phone interview.

The canola RVT program had been independent of the provincial RVT program before the provincial government changes. The canola performance trials (CPT) are run by the provincial and national canola growers associations in partnership with industry and provincial oilseed specialists. Previously, the CPT technical committee chair had been Murray Hartman, Alberta’s provincial oilseed specialist. Following his retirement though, he wasn’t replaced by the province.

“That has shifted over to the other side of the Prairies. So now I chair that with help from my Saskatchewan counterpart. Right now we don’t have any Alberta government representation but we do have Alberta farmers voices as directors of our governance committee,” Dane Froese, CPT technical committee chair and Manitoba Agriculture oilseed specialist, explains in a phone interview.

The 2021 growing season was an adjustment for all groups involved in the RVT program, but the kinks are getting worked out.

Annual RVT Program Process

While there may be different groups handling the RVT programs, the annual process is similar for all starting in the winter with the planning stage.

In the winter, around late February, requests are sent out to the seed companies asking which crop varieties they would like to enter into the RVT programs for the year. Seed collection from the companies is then co-ordinated by the RVT program coordinators.

The seed is treated with appropriate seed treatments and inoculants in the case of pulse crops. It’s then divided and weighed out to be sent to individual trial cooperators.

Field books are sent along with the seed to the trial cooperators. The field books have plot randomizations and field data entry files in them. Plots are then planted in May.

2021 canola performance trial site

Drones are a key tool used for evaluating uniformity of plots during inspections of 2021 canola performance trial sites. Photo: Ryan Murphy for CPT

The field trial cooperators collect data on their plots throughout the growing season. The plots are also visited at least once throughout the season by someone with the RVT program coordinators to check on them.

They do “a tour of all the CPT locations, taking drone imagery and grading the plots to make sure that there’s no major deficiencies and things appear as they normally would for research sites and reflective of good farm management. Those notes are then compiled and our technical committee meets in late July to review the site progress so far. And if anything comes up, we can head it off before it gets too far down the line and gets too expensive to have failure later in the year,” Froese says.

Through August and into October (depending on the crop and weather) plots are harvested across the province. Data is then sent to the RVT program coordinators who compile it into tables, review and analyze it. The tables are reviewed by industry professionals before they are published in the Alberta Seed Guide in late January/early February.

Check out the RVT Variety Trials page here

APG handles publication of their data slightly differently than their counterparts. Province-wide data is published in the Alberta Seed Guide, while site specific data is also published on their smartphone app.

“That was actually an overwhelming request from our farmers who said, ‘The regional data is good, but it will mean more to me if I can also compare it with something very close to home,’” Walker explains. “The reason that we provide that information is it’s a good checkpoint for a farmer to say, ‘Okay, you know what, I’m really similar to this.’”

There is one difference readers of the Alberta Seed Guide will see on the RVT tables this year. The cereal check varieties have been updated for wheat to AC Brandon, CDC Copeland for barley and CF Camden for oats.

“To qualify as a check variety, it does have to meet certain parameters and things, not just large acreage. So it is in a way related to registration. When the registration trials update checks, we also want to maintain that through the regional variety trial system,” Strydhorst says.

RVT Program Provides Invaluable Information

The RVT program provides growers with an unbiased source of information, the groups running the programs agree. While seed companies complete and publish their own trials, it can be hard to sort through crop varieties and compare them across the board.

“It can get confusing to navigate through multiple different life science companies, websites and marketing material and what different retailers have,” Froese explains. “Farmers can make that decision to find that yield information all in one place to compare it as a percentage across the board, or whatever their favourite variety is, without having to go through 14 different web pages.”

Strydhorst stresses the RVT program data comes from an independent third party, unlike data from seed companies. This gives farmers unbiased yield and disease information on crop varieties from multiple seed companies, which is all compared to the same check varieties.

Wheat RVT trials

Wheat RVT trials at Bow Island, Alta. grown by AAFC Lethbridge technical staff, under irrigation on July 16, 2021. Photo: Sheri Strydhorst, Alberta Wheat and Barley Commission

The seed companies data “might be from their trials saying that variety, A, B, C was 10 per cent better than the other varieties, but what were they comparing to? We’re comparing to the same list of varieties at each of the different sites,” Westerlund adds.

The associations plan to keep running the RVT programs as they know it’s important to farmers across the province.

“Anytime we ask our membership, which is 6,500 growers across the province, there’s a decent voice there. They all say that it’s really helpful in making management decisions,” Walker says. “Anytime that we can empower decision making, I think that’s a win.”

Header photo — Barley RVT trials at Westlock, Alta. grown by Gateway Research Organization, on Aug. 9, 2021. Photo: Sheri Strydhorst, Alberta Wheat and Barley Commission

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