Germinal Horizon Wiltshire

Germinal Horizon Wiltshire has been established to spearhead a new programme of trials and development work geared to helping UK farmers create more resilient and sustainable businesses.

Through our work at Germinal Horizon Wiltshire and our wider collaborations, we are building a knowledge hub that will benefit UK livestock farmers and the industry at a time when the need to maximise returns from forage is greater than it has ever been.

Reinvesting in research from the ground up

Alongside the work of variety assessment, the Germinal Horizon Wiltshire goes deeper, looking at more applied applications, seed rate optimisation, not just to save costs, but also to ensure the subsequent crops are at optimum plant density.

Nutrient management is a “hot topic”, agriculture needs to become more efficient in the way it uses nutrients, trials are taking place with targeted seed treatments, to place small but essential levels of nutrient directly with the seed for maximum efficiency, combined with new varieties of grass and clover, developed at IBERS with a lower requirement for Nitrogen and Phosphate are now being trialled.

The Research station is also looking at crop rotation methods and timing of establishment, for example drilling new novel species of winter active Triticale (T100) directly in to maize stubble alongside controls, such as Italian Ryegrass. Where we are looking for multiple benefits, soils stabilisation, lower nutrient run off and a harvestable silage yield in early spring.

The research facility is comprehensively equipped, staffed by Jo Matthews, formerly head of forage trials for the National Institute of Agricultural Botany (NIAB). It has a modern Haldrup plot harvester with on-board Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (NIRS) capability, ovens for drying crops and the latest seed drills and crop establishment equipment.

Germinal Horizon enquiries

If you have any questions about the research of Germinal Horizon, then please get in touch.