High yielding dual purpose variety ticks all the right boxes confirms independent agronomist Craig Green

         A new high yielding, early maturing maize variety that has successfully come through two years of independent UK trials could help maize growers caught out by adverse wet weather that delayed maize harvests and led to drilling delays for following crops during the last two seasons.

         Mojito, bred by MAS Seeds and marketed in the UK by Elsoms Seeds, has all the right agronomic attributes and end-market flexibility to become a strong addition to the Elsoms maize portfolio says Elsoms Head of Agricultural Sales, Toby Reich.

            Toby adds” With maize seed treatment viability secured for 2024, the UK-grown maize industry can at least start to look forward more positively. At Elsoms, we have renewed our focus on helping our maize customers to achieve their key business goals in successfully adapting to changes in both the political and environmental outlook for the UK maize sector.

       “Following two years of difficult late season harvesting conditions there are genuine concerns amongst many maize growers around later maturing varieties. When you look at the current dynamics of farm purchases for maize seed, around 70% of farmers are now opting for earlier maturing varieties as a conscious move towards earlier lifting and smoother establishment of the following crop. With a further 15-20 large scale AD plants expected to become operational by 2025-2026, I predict a rise in the maize growing area for bio-gas production so there’s a stronger case for dual purpose varieties able to supply both silage and bio-gas markets with more emphasis on selecting early maturing varieties that produce both high dry-matter (DM) and energy yields.

         “Following our launch of the maize variety Neutrino 5 years ago, we have worked successfully with a wide range of national distributor partners including HLH and Procam – as well as developing key strategic relationships with smaller agronomy groups such as CMG Agronomy. All have helped Elsoms in our key objective to supply UK maize growers with the best varieties to suit their maize market objectives” confirms Toby.

         One such partner, Craig Green, of Norfolk based CMG Agronomy, began working with Elsoms in 2018 whilst trialing Neutrino. He supports Toby’s view on future trends towards earlier maturing, dual-use varieties and predicts that many maize growers will trade-off a small percentage of yield in order to lift crops 2-3 weeks earlier if future adverse harvest conditions continue to persist.

          Craig says” Most of my farmer customers now see maize as the key break crop for wheat, instead of sugar beet or spring barley, because it achieves higher gross margins. Although it’s been a generally good year for maize yields, it also turned out to be another late harvest for many growers, with June becoming a low energy month due to a lack of sunlight in many parts of the UK. This resulted in the FAO maturity date of many maize crops stalling, making every maize variety mature later, which then led to later lifting dates that delayed the establishment of following wheat crops.

        “With later harvest dates now becoming the new normal, I can see a move towards earlier varieties with FAO maturity dates of 190-200 and that’s certainly a positive for new varieties such as Mojito. Although early maturing, Mojito has delivered the same yield as varieties with an FAO of 210-220 in trials I’ve conducted over the last 2 years and its consistency to perform well on all soil types should help it gain traction with maize growers throughout the UK.

           “Across 8 on-farm trials it has achieved average fresh weight yields of 40.5t/ha – equivalent to the yield I’d normally expect to see from a variety 2 FAO groups higher. It’s an old-fashioned, wide leaf plant that attracts a lot of sunlight with its wider canopy and is best suited to 75cm row widths. Starch content looks good, my customers confirm that it goes into beef cattle quite nicely, and its certainly dual-purpose for those considering it for bio-gas production.

     “In our 2023 trial we assessed 35 maize varieties in total, with Mojito delivering the second highest fresh-weight yield in its maturity class. It looks a very good value for money variety and with good standing ability, plus low cob, it’s less likely to suffer from brackling.

        “Going into 2024 Mojito should gain acreage, dislodging some of the older varieties in the 190-200 class and, for many large-scale AD growers, I think it’s a good fit alongside later maturing varieties such as Neutrino. Particularly for growers on lighter land who aren’t as effected by difficult lifting conditions and need to stagger supply into bio-gas plants” he concludes.

Elsoms Seed Specialist Emily Pick endorses Craig’s assessment of Mojito and predicts a promising future for the variety.

          She adds “Mojito has a solid agronomic profile combining a score of 7 for vigor with an 8.3 for resistance to lodging. With high yields and fast early development this variety also has a very good stay green score of 7.7 that secures the silage harvest date for farmers. With a growing maize portfolio, that includes 2 other early maturing maize varieties in Makayla and Indem 1631, we are investing in providing an extensive trialing network that offers valuable information to both merchant customers and farmers”.