The new guide for winegrape growers provides information on improving crop yield and managing disease
The Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture (TIA) has produced a new guide to help winegrape producers overcome major production constraints caused by disease.
Called ‘Producer Led Trials: A guide for winegrape producers and service providers’, the guide is a resource is for those seeking more effective and efficient ways to conduct an in-vineyard trial that integrates with their existing vineyard operations and supports commercial decisions.
The guide contains four learning modules with step-by-step instructions, resources and case studies from multiple states in Australia on how to conduct simple and informative in-vineyard trials.
The project leader, TIA professor Kathy Evans, says the guide will help growers make informed decisions.
“Information from effective in-vineyard trials can support decisions about small or large changes to vineyard operations while helping producers learn more about their production sites,” Evans says.
“However, conducting a trial means investing time and resources that could be applied elsewhere on the vineyard. Trials must therefore deliver timely information relevant to business needs, a practical outcome as well as a return on investment. If not, then trial results may be inconclusive or a complete waste of time and money.
“This guide is about helping producers achieve a return on investment from trials in which they have ownership. This means striking a balance between trial rigour and producing commercially relevant results that apply to existing vineyard operations.”
The guide has its origins from the findings of multiple research projects and case studies with winegrape producers, including trials to inform better management of botrytis bunch rot disease.
“Producers want to know by how much a crop variable changes due to their actions and are less interested in the statistics used by researchers. However, they still want confidence in results that they can interpret according to site characteristics and available solutions,” Evans says.
TIA says this is different from other types of on-farm trials.
“Some approaches encourage growers to adopt the methods of researchers, while other trials are designed to help growers learn about a new practise or technology,” Evans says.
“Our approach is to purposefully bridge the gap between research-led trials and on-farm trial and error. That is, a trial that has both rigour and relevance.
“The key principle for this guide is that the trial is directed at farm business decision making rather than scientific advancement.”
The publication was funded by the TAS Farm Innovation Hub which is funded by the Australian Government’s Future Drought Fund.
TAS Farm Innovation Hub Director Sandra Knowles says the guide is a great initiative to help build stronger partnerships between farmers and researchers.
“It’s about making trials more useful on the ground, giving farmers a bigger role in shaping innovation, and making research more practical and relevant to real farming challenges,” she says.
“By improving how on-farm trials are done, this guide can help farmers test new ideas that boost productivity and build resilience to changing climate conditions.”
Farmers can access the Producer Led Trials: A guide for winegrape producers and service providers online here.
