A new mid-season lupin flowering gene is set to tackle some longstanding headaches for growers, offering more choice, more flexibility and new opportunities to improve the performance of lupins in farming systems, especially in Western Australia.

WA retains the mantle of the world’s largest producer and exporter of narrow-leafed lupins, accounting for 80% of global production.

The development of early-flowering varieties in the 1960s and 1970s helped narrow-leafed lupins adapt to WA’s acidic sandy soils. But the early-flowering gene, known as Ku, has locked growers into a small flowering window.

This causes trouble when current varieties are sown early because they tend to bolt into flower, increasing the risk of frost and heat damage.

By finishing too soon, they can also miss the chance to build biomass and yield, especially during longer growing seasons in higher-rainfall zones, making them less competitive as a break crop against other pulses and canola.

University of Western Australia (UWA) Institute of Agriculture Associate Director and plant breeder Professor Wallace Cowling says uptake of soil amelioration in acidic sandy soils across southern Australia, together with reduced waterlogging in high-rainfall zones, is expanding the area suitable for mid-season lupins.

 “They are starting to become an option,” he says.

Wild lupin adds value

The new gene, known as the P gene for mid-season flowering, was found in a wild lupin plant, P22660, collected in Israel in 1973 and introduced to Australia and global genebanks.

In the 2010s, PhD student Candy Taylor and her co-supervisors at UWA – geneticist Dr Matthew Nelson and plant breeder Professor Cowling – identified the P gene at the same chromosome position as the Ku gene.

The Council of Grain Grower Organisations (COGGO) funded efforts to cross P22660 into commercial cultivars in 2019. 

A collaboration between GRDC, COGGO, UWA and commercial lupin breeding company Australian Grain Technologies (AGT) Pty Ltd extended that work to a 3-year project in August 2023.

Mid-season flexibility

In UWA glasshouse testing, plants with the new P gene flowered about 15 to 20 days later than standard Ku lupins and 40 days earlier than late-flowering Ku types, such as Geebung and Uniharvest.

Project team members (L–R): Karen Nelson, Dr Aneeta Pradhan and Professor Wallace Cowling at UWA, where lupin backcrossing was undertaken from 2023 to 2026. Photo: Karen Nelson

They also grew 15 to 30 cm taller than Ku lupins by first flower. That extra time and height translates into more biomass and better yield potential when the season allows, as well as higher harvest height and easier pick-up, especially on sandy paddocks.

GRDC Genetic Technologies Manager (Pulses) Dr Camilla Hill says the implications for Australian lupin growers are significant.

“Mid-season flowering lupins give growers greater flexibility to take advantage of early sowing opportunities, particularly in seasons with an early break,” she says.

“These new lines mature a bit later, which is an excellent fit for longer-season, higher-rainfall environments down south...with potential for more biomass, yield and better quality.”

Professor Cowling also sees a clear opportunity for early sowing in WA’s main lupin belt. If growers could sow lupins a month earlier and use mid-season varieties that still flower at the right time, lupins become much more competitive with other crops for those early breaks.

As the new types will be taller and leafier, they should also fix more nitrogen, lifting the yield potential of following cereals and canola while trimming fertiliser nitrogen bills.

In this GRDC and COGGO project at UWA, P lines were backcrossed into AGT’s elite lupin varieties, so they are already close in agronomic type to current varieties, but with the new flowering behaviour built in.

“In May 2026 we delivered seed of 33 mid-season P lines to AGT lupin breeder Dr Matt Aubert,” Professor Cowling says. 

“It will be exciting to see the P lupins growing in the field at AGT in Northam WA in spring.”

This will be AGT’s first opportunity to multiply seed and check performance. One or 2 seasons to generate enough seed will allow for full material testing. 

Following that, sites in areas not traditionally targeted such as Albany and Esperance will be trialled.

Australian Grain Technologies lupin breeder Dr Matt Aubert in one of the plots growing the mid-season lupin lines at Karranadgin, north of Northam, WA. Photo: supplied by Matt Aubert

Future research to boost yield

The plan is to run time-of-sowing trials in those southern zones and compare the mid-season lines with current varieties across multiple sowing dates. 

Dr Aubert says the hope is to develop higher-yielding lines, but even if yields are similar to existing lines, the extra flexibility will be of benefit.

“There’s some merit if it just equals current yields but gives a bigger sowing or harvest window,” he says.

“If these lines let growers sow earlier or harvest a bit later and still get the same yield as a traditional variety, that’s a real positive.”

On current timelines, AGT expects the first commercial mid-season lupin varieties based on this material to be ready for release around 2032-33, if they perform well in yield and disease screens.

This article appeared in GroundCover.