Farmer Focus: Double-drilling success to control blackgrass

It still feels unseasonably dry and from past experience Mother Nature has a habit of levelling the books.

Rains in early September were enough to germinate blackgrass and with low dormancy, stale seed-beds are working well.

Vespa winter bean drilling started on 15 September, shortly followed by Skyfall third and fourth wheats on clean fields, with Extase to follow.

About the author

Keith Challen

Arable Farmer Focus writer

Keith Challen manages 1,200ha of heavy clay soils in the Vale of Belvoir, Leicestershire, for Belvoir Farming Company. Cropping includes wheat, oilseed rape and elderflowers. The farm is also home to the Belvoir Fruit Farms drinks business.

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Seed-beds on the whole are very good and although dry on the surface, there is some moisture at 50mm, so care still needs to be taken not to cause any compaction.

Last year’s trials of double drilling on our worst blackgrass fields were a success.

We either drilled again between the first drilled rows or drilled at 90deg to the first pass, and although this goes against the principles of controlled traffic farming, I’m keen to find as many cultural controls for blackgrass as possible.

See also: Optimism for blackgrass control grows with new herbicide Luximo

In terms of which worked best, both had the positive effect of reducing blackgrass numbers, although drilling between the rows had the greatest effect.

So I intend to replicate it again this year to see if it was just luck. Other trials this year included using Tiros seed treatment from Unium Bioscience.

Everywhere we used it there was a reasonable yield uplift and again we will be trialling again this year. It looks like the increased root mass helped with drought tolerance.

Also this year we dabbled with growing a crop of low-input spring barley, no graminicide was used and only a cheap and cheerful broad-leaved weed herbicide.

No fungicide, no bagged fertiliser, with only manure for nutrition. Although it stayed clean and looked well, the gross margin is about £270/ha worse than our conventionally grown crop, and I have to admit this was a little disappointing.

However, I’m keen to have another go, with possibly a low rate of nitrogen this time.

Finally, I’d like to pay my respects, first to the late Queen, who set an example we could all learn from of selfless devotion and service, and second to a fellow farmer, Tim Marris, who recently passed away. You’ll be greatly missed mate.