Farmer Focus: Wheat varieties are a hare v tortoise race

My Bamford wheat has hared away this spring and, in its haste, caught a dose of septoria.

The problem is, I was bitten a couple of years ago with my previously low-input Extase when it broke down and the disease was too much to catch up with.

So, twice shy, I have applied a T1 fungicide rather sooner than I would have liked, even though I am aware that may leave me open to a painful T1.5.

See also: How funding is helping farmers with foliar nutrition efficacy

About the author

Andrew Barr

Arable Farmer Focus writer

Andy Barr farms 700ha in a family partnership in Kent. Combinable crops amount to about 400ha and include milling wheat and malting barley in an increasingly varied rotation. He also grazes 800 Romney ewes and 40 Sussex cattle and the farm uses conservation agriculture methods.

Read more articles by Andrew Barr

In contrast, the Vibe has developed in a more tortoise-like fashion and is clean and producing leaves at conventional times.

We shall see who wins the margin race, but I do fear what the cost of getting the Vibe to milling specification in harvest 2027 might be.

I understand that, adjusted for inflation, global food prices hit their highest level ever in the 1970s after conflict in the Middle East caused an energy crisis.

With its huge natural gas reserves, Qatar produces half of the urea traded openly on world markets and it is difficult to see the damaged facilities being repaired quickly.

Added to that the price of pesticides seems to be closely linked with that of naphtha, an oil derivative used to create a vast array of chemicals and plastic packaging, and two wars have recently damaged three of its largest exporting hubs.

So it is unsurprising that I have recently heard reports from Australia of farmers wondering whether to plant oilseed rape or not due to a lack of diesel and fertiliser, and I am also wondering what to do.

I’ve heard politicians lately suggest we simply use more manure. Thanks for that advice, I’ll simply just stop burying it in the back yard.

I have tried all sorts of new biological products and foliar nitrogens in recent years and, so far, I haven’t managed to be as well off as with bagged N.

Maybe some of these products might come into their own if we can only afford to apply half our normal fertiliser?