A network of farmers who carry out their own on-farm trials
SRW Project Progress
Project Progress
Below you will be able to find information on how the initial aims and plans of the project along with up to date information on where it is today. Take a look and make sure to get in touch if you have any questions.
Year 2: 1 April 2023 – 31 March 2024
We are so pleased to welcome all of our new Slug Scout recruits! We have been busy preparing Slug Scout packs to send out. The John Innes Centre are looking forward to receiving all of your grey field slugs and putting them to good use. Make sure to share pictures of your scouting journey on The Slug Circle forum:
As our Slug Circle and Scouts prepare for a new year of exciting trials, BOFIN took a trip to visit Simon Griffiths at the John Innes Centre. Watch this video to learn more about initial feeding trials and more detail at how slugs graze.
As the new trials are being planned, it is important that you send your slugs in again! We must come together and ensure that the John Innes Centre receive enough slugs to give us another year of great results! Click the button below to get your Slug Scout pack today!
Watkins 788 is one of a collection of landrace wheats being screened for interesting traits by scientists working on the Defra-funded Wheat Genetic Improvement Network (WGIN) programme. 10 Slug Sleuths conducted trials for this project by following an in-field trial protocol drawn up by slug behaviour expert Professor Keith Walters of Harper Adams University. Watch the results from Year 1 here >
Click the button below to read about Year 1 in more detail:
The project aims to test in field to confirm properties indicated in lab-based feeding trials. The hope is that there will be 10 Slug Sleuths – farmer members of BOFIN – who will establish trial plots of Watkins 788 alongside their farm standard variety and monitor slug activity following a protocol drawn up by prof Keith Walters (HAU). Four of the farmers will also test an unnamed KWS Santiago x Graham line bred by John Blackman.
The project will also include feeding trials at John Innes Centre exploring further the properties of the Watkins + farm-standard lines + c80 Watkins + Paragon Recombinant Inbred Lines (RILs) developed by Designing Future Wheat team, led by Dr Simon Griffiths (JIC).
