Easy running at Bradbury Barton

Phil Daniels is making excellent progress with harvest at Bradbury Barton, South Molton, Devon, with some very good yields as well.

“This is our first year away from organic crops and it’s all going extremely well,” he said.

The 160ha of Quench spring barley that he had cut so far was yielding 7.5-8t/ha and coming off at 13.5-16% moisture.

“We’ve only had to dry 40% of the crop, which makes a huge difference to last year,” he said.

“The sample is very good, with a bushel weight of 73kg/hl, and the straw is yielding just under 5t/ha.”

Much of the winter wheat had also exceeded expectations, although there was a remarkable difference between varieties, said Mr Daniels.

“We’ve cut 140ha of wheat, split between Alchemy, Stigg and Gravitas. Alchemy was the best by far and reached 10t/ha.”

Stigg was the noticeably less favoured variety, yielding around 2t/ha less than Alchemy and Gravitas. 

“The grain was of poor quality with a pinched appearance,” said Mr Daniels. “It’s clear the crop suffered from the dry period we experienced this summer.” 

With 80ha of Firth spring oats to go, Mr Daniels was hoping for 6t/ha, judging by the appearance of the crop.

“All in all, we’re very pleased with the year so far,” he said. “The year’s proved perfect for us and we’re hoping to be finished within the next 10 days.”

Crop: Winter wheat
Variety: Alchemy, Gravitas and Stigg
Area: 140ha
Yield: 8-10t/ha

Crop: Spring Barley
Variety: Quench
Area: 160ha
Yield: 7.5-8t/ha