The 2026 Seed Special is here — and variety choice has never mattered more

2026 Seed Special

Our 2026 Seed Special is out now, and if you read only one section before this autumn's drilling, make it the variety pages.

Here's the short version of why. With effective chemistry getting scarcer and the chemistry that remains getting dearer, the variety you put in the ground is doing more of the heavy lifting on disease and standing than it used to. Yield score alone won't carry a crop through a bad rust year. So this year, as always, Peter Collins and the seed team have cut the recommended list down to a manageable shortlist for the North of England and Scotland — chosen on disease profile, standing ability and quality, not just headline yield.

A few of the picks worth your attention:

RGT Hexton (Group 4 soft) — joint highest yielding variety in the North two years running, an 8 for yellow rust from a diverse resistance background, and genuinely suited to early drilling. Strong as a second wheat, too. If you want a robust soft feed that can chase a soft wheat premium without a yield penalty, start here.

Sparkler (Group 4 soft, newly recommended) — the highest yielding soft wheat on the list and top five overall, with a 7.2 for septoria and a 7 for yellow rust. Consistent across two very different seasons, flexible on drilling slot, and well suited to the distilling market.

KWS Arnie (Group 2) — the highest yielding Group 2 on the new RL, 7s for both yellow rust and septoria, and a dual-purpose feed/milling spec. Looking clean in the field this season when plenty of others aren't.

LG Defiance and LG Challenger (Group 4 hard, both newly recommended) — Defiance carries the highest untreated yield on the new RL, which tells you something about how little it leans on the sprayer. Challenger is the better agronomic package of the two and the standout early driller.

On the barley side, Kitty is the highest yielding two-row feed in the region with the best specific weight on the list and dual-strain BaYMV resistance — worth knowing if soil-borne virus is a problem in your rotation.

The Seed Special also covers the full winter wheat comparison chart, oilseed rape variety choices (Pinnacle, the LG hybrid range, and the new DSV Dompteur), winter barley agronomy tips, and the latest on what we've been investing in across Piercebridge, Tyne Dock and Meldon.

Now is the time to be thinking about the autumn drilling campaign. Barley orders in particular need to come in early, before we switch the plant over to wheat production.

To talk through variety selection for your ground, contact your regular GrainCo representative or the seed office direct:

• Seed Office, Tyne Dock — Kate Grix, 0191 428 7700

• Piercebridge Plant — Peter Collins, 01325 728 905

Thank you, as ever, for your continued support.