Scientists are preparing to reveal the results of a pioneering farming study on a wheat variety believed to be resistant to slugs.

The trial, the first of its type to be conducted by UK farmers, will be discussed at a webinar on March 16.

It is co-ordinated by the British On-Farm Innovation Network (BOFIN), a group aiming to help reduce farmers' reliance on environmentally-damaging pesticides.

Ten farmer members of the network, named "Slug Sleuths", were contracted to establish trial plots of a wheat named Watkins 788 - part of a heritage collection from the 1930s.

This variety has never been grown before on commercial farms, but initial laboratory feeding studies at the Norwich Research Park have shown it may be resistant to slugs.

The trial plots, sown using seed multiplied at the John Innes Centre's field station at Bawburgh, were compared with the farms' standard wheat variety and monitored closely by the farmers for slug activity.

The results were analysed by Keith Walters, a professor of pest management at Harper Adams University in Shropshire.

Also speaking at the webinar will be Dr Simon Griffiths, a group leader at the John Innes Centre in Norwich, who will explain the genetics of Watkins 788 and the quest for slug-resistant traits.

BOFIN founder Tom Allen-Stevens said the project had proven the case for farmer-led research, and that farmers were capable of carrying out the fieldwork to prove the concept.

"It would never have got under way had it not been for the enthusiasm of the farmers who got involved," he said.

The feeding trials are the final element of the project, which also involved volunteer “Slug Scouts”, who have gathered slugs from fields across the country and sent them to Norwich for the lab-based feeding studies at the John Innes Centre.

To register for the webinar see bofin.org.uk.