Tim Payne has had a good first harvest as farm manager for Hyde-Parker Farms, Long Melford, Suffolk, with barley, rapeseed and wheat all in the shed.

All crops fared pretty well, with yields pleasing across the whole farm.

“I put a spray on the Oakley after T3 but it’s meant merchants are biting our arm off for it as the bushel weight is 73-75kg/hl. It’s really held its own, yielding 8.5t/ha.”

Santiago had also performed well, out-yielding Oakley at 9.5t/ha, although the bushel weight was down to 70kg/hl.

“Second wheats didn’t do too badly either,” said Mr Payne. “They left plenty of straw and probably averaged around 8t/ha.”

High Eurucic rapeseed had yielded 3.2t/ha, with conventional varieties coming in at 3.7t/ha, all of which was pretty pleasing.

Tipple spring barley also did really well, making the malting specification and yielding 8.5t/ha.

“The only problem with the spring barley was the headlands, which let it down and probably pulled our average down to just over 7t/ha.

“It did take us three attempts to cut it,” he added. “It was too tall to spray off so was fairly green at first, and then we had a breakdown – but eventually we got it done. It’s not been too bad, considering.”

Despite getting stuck with the combine a couple of times, land was now fairly dry, allowing Mr Payne to get on with land work today (19 September).