One thing about Spring Wheat is that it has a great appearance in the field. The crop is not as prone to Septoria as winter sown crops and it is relatively easy to keep the rust at bay.
Spring wheat has no vernalisation requirement and although we don’t actually register such things the influence of day length on final leaf number is quite important in that it controls a varieties ability to set more or less leaves as well as influence flowering date.
Compared to winter sown crops those planted in the spring show higher relative growth rates, higher nitrogen concentrations in the above ground dry matter, higher relative nitrogen uptake rates and higher nitrogen concentrations in the grain and straw. Hence spring wheat’s should make milling spec easily!
So where’s the catch? Well it can be as simple as drought which has a negative effect on establishment or later crop growth or Ergot in the harvested grain, more commonly found after a damp flowering period.