Farmer Focus: The Champions League of drilling conditions
Richard Harris © Emily Fleur This autumn has been very kind so far, and near perfect for no-till drilling; the Champions League of conditions in many ways here in South Devon.
In mid-September we had the compost and cattle manure spread in great conditions and barely left a mark.
See also: Farmer Focus: Early end to wheat drilling and OSR failures
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This should keep our potash and phosphate levels where we want them, while adding to our organic matter and general soil health levels.
We held our nerve as the weather forecast seemed to be on our side, spraying off our linseed stubble in early October with very little weed chit since August – just a few patches of fumitory and chickweed to sort out.
The summer catch crop of mustard, linseed, buckwheat, volunteer wheat and weeds really kicked into gear in late-September with a stand about knee high.
We’ve found 2, 4-D to be very useful in with the glyphosate for desiccating, as these plants need something extra in the autumn.
Both the first wheats behind the linseed and the second wheats behind the summer catch crop have gone in well.
I’m not even sure a power harrow could have done the job the linseed and catch crops have done to our seed-beds.
And with diesel prices boarding on ridiculous, we are really seeing the benefit of this system now.
We’ve home saved our blend of Mayflower, Champion, Solitaire, Palladium and Bamford, which certainly has its yellow rust concerns but it seems most varieties do these days.
It got treated with a nutrient seed treatment after cleaning, which should aid the crops’ foundation building phase over the winter and gives us a decent platform going into the spring. I’m sure 50% of the yield potential has been set by Christmas.
If you want to look at it from a different angle, yield potential has a cap on it by Christmas being reduced from the 20t/ha potential we had before we even considered planting it.
I’d guess that most wheat crops go into the new year with about a 12t/ha maximum potential if everything went well.
So I think we need to do more this side of Christmas to keep that up nearer 15t/ha if we want to be growing profitable crops with these high growing costs.
