James Dean has made considerable progress with the harvest on the back of good weather in recent weeks.

But he wasn’t able to harvest on Monday (Aug 9) on his farm near Salisbury, Wilts, because of wet weather setting in over much of the west.

Unlike many growers this year, however, his oilseed rape has been more pleasing than his barley.

Mr Dean has finished harvesting 280ha (700 acre) of oilseed rape, with yields varying between 3.46-3.95 t/ha (1.4-1.6 t/acre).

He is pleased he chose to use minimum tillage.

“We min-tilled and rolled it in quick so we had no problems with establishment at all.”

Choosing Canberra, a low biomass variety also helped. It fared better in the storms last month than some other varieties, notes.

“Everyone else’s Winner was flat, but my Canberra’s all standing, which I’m pretty pleased about.”

Winter barley has been variable this year with good yields at 7.41 t/ha (3 t/acre) but was hampered by high levels of nitrogen.

“Some of it has had to be sold as feed while the rest of it was right on the border.”

He admits to “not being shy about putting nitrogen on to make it grow”.

On his spring barley Mr Dean used chicken manure which proved to work very well by keeping yields up and nitrogen levels down.

“I shall be using a lot more of it next year,” he said.

Mr Dean has just made a start on his Soissons wheat by harvesting 29ha (70 acres) at 7.41 t/ha (3 t/acre), but has been forced to stop due to rain.

“This weather’s frustrating – I just want to carry on.”