“We‘ll have finished by tomorrow midday (Sept 2) – it pleases me enormously to know we‘ve nearly finished.”

He started off with 690ha (1,700 acres) and has only another 32ha (80 acres) still to do.

Yields have been relatively good with 9.88 t/ha (4 t/acre) being the bench mark, he said. The highest yields go up to 11.74 t/ha (4.75 t/acre).

Mr Hornshaw has been using 3 combines with 30 foot, 25 foot and 20 foot headers.

“If anything we‘re slightly over combined, but I‘m just happy to have got most of it in now.”

There is still another 120ha (300 acres) of beans to be done. But Mr Hornshaw said he was going to wait for his drier to clear some of its backlog before making a start.

“We‘ve been burning the midnight oil – the drier has been running constantly, 24 hours a day.”

Moisture contents were getting down to 15% today (Sep 1), but rarely have they been below 20%.

Even though Mr Hornshaw is one of the furthest ahead on his harvest in the area, he said he is still far behind schedule.

“On September 3 last year we had finished the beans.”

He has also made a start on drilling the oilseed rape, saying: “We‘re banging the rape in – with the amount of moisture in the ground. It should germinate without a problem.”