Optimizing yield and quality in malting barley by the governance of field cultivation conditions

This study evaluates how cultivation location, year, soil conditions and starter fertilizer interact and determine yield and quality of malting barley. Size exclusion high performance liquid chromatography (SE-HPLC) was applied to determine protein composition in mature and malted barley.The effects of starter fertilizer treatments on yield and quality of malting barley was largely hidden by the impact of growing location and cultivation year on these parameters. Here, the highest yield and the lowest grain protein concentration was found in samples cultivated on sandy soil with adequate precipitation and a relatively low soil temperature (below 15-17 degrees C) during grain filling. In malted grains, the general change in protein composition as related to mature grains, was a decrease in the polymerized protein fractions and an increase in the more easily extractable and smaller proteins. However, cultivation conditions impacted the changes of the protein fractions; the highest break-down rates of polymerized proteins was found for samples cultivated on sandy soil with enough precipitation and a relatively low soil temperature (below 15-17 degrees C) during grain filling. Thus, the sandy soil, enough precipitation and relatively low soil temperature were the most beneficial both for grain yield and for protein based quality of the malting barley.