Yield and quality stability of common winter wheat varieties

The research is conducted in large scale farms with conventional crop practices in more than 200 000 da. The stability of grain yield and quality of common winter wheat varieties is evaluated. Bulgarian and European well known varieties – Enola, Avenue and Albertus, have been studied during 3 consecutive years. Bread qualities as crude protein content, wet gluten content, falling number and grain yield in kilograms per dekar and test weight have been analyzed. The on-farm trial reveals relatively good and stable productive potential, depending mainly on the genotype. High negative correlation between yield and bread quality is found. Higher Avenue yields are accompanied by a higher coefficient of variation and lower bread qualities of the grain. Better content of wet gluten, crude protein and falling number are found in Albertus and Enola. Main factor, controlling variation of the bread qualities is the variety, but the environmental conditions also have significant influence on the stability of these traits. The falling number is determined mostly by the climate conditions and therefore varies greatly during the years of study. The most optimal ratio of yield, quality and stability of the wheat production is obtained with the Bulgarian variety Enola.