Farmers bogged down by autumn field work
This mud-lashed farmer is battling the elements to complete this year’s apple harvest in squalid conditions mirrored up and down the country.
Weeks of constant rain in Herefordshire have left parts of Harry Cotterell’s farm “looking like a First World War landscape”.
“We have made a terrible mess, but we have got most of the apple harvesting done,” said Mr Cotterell, president of the Country Land and Business Association.
Yields are averaging about 18t/acre this year – about 15% lower than he had been hoping for.
“The past two years for apples have not been good. When the weather is good and it’s dry, harvesting apples is a breeze,” he said.
“But as soon as it starts getting muddy, it becomes hard work and you have to clean all the apples as well.”
In this picture, taken on Friday (16 November) at Mr Cotterell’s Garnons estate, near Hereford, orchard manager Nigel Holden is trudging through the mud, surveying which rows of apples are to be harvested next.
Although apple harvesting has been difficult this year, Mr Cotterell said potato lifting has been much worse.
“We rent land to a spud grower and he’s a month later than he should be,” he explained.
“In one 34-acre field, there are three acres left to harvest. But the field’s that muddy I just don’t know how he’s going to get them out. It’s just been dreadful.”
Despite the mud, Mr Cotterell has managed to drill all his first and second wheats this autumn.
But he added: “We have been really struggling behind potatoes. We have also had a lot of slug damage and have had to apply several applications of slug pellets.
“What we have got in is growing very slowly. The oilseed rape looks like it’s at the same growth stage as it normally would be at the end of September.”
The latest Potato Council Grower Panel Lifting Survey estimates that more than 102,000ha – 84% of the total crop – has been harvested.
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