Oilseed rape yields are looking good at Chivers Farms Ltd, Impington, Cambridge, where farm manager Alister Farr has cut 75ha so far.

“We’ve harvested about 55ha of Avatar and 20ha of DK Extrovert – but we’ve had to leave small blocks in most fields so can’t confirm exact yields,” he said.

However, he expected to exceed his budgeted 3.8t/ha, with yields likely to be close to 4t/ha and moisture contents below 9%.

“With its earliness of flowering taken with its early maturity, Avatar was one of the first oilseed rape crops harvested in the Cambridge area,” said Craig Padley of LS Plant Breeding Ltd (LSPB).

See also: All of the harvest news on our Harvest Highlights page

Mr Farr also had Quartz and PT211 grown on a different farm. “They look okay, but are probably too thick; there are too many plants,” he said.

“Wet ground conditions also meant we couldn’t travel early enough in the spring, so they were short of nitrogen and bolted quickly.”

Mr Farr only one field of winter barley, to provide an early window for LSPB rapeseed trials, but that wouldn’t be ready to cut until next week, assuming the weather dried up.

“It tipped it down this morning – combines have been rolling around here but there’s nothing being cut today (11 July).”

Grafton winter wheat would probably be ready by the end of the month, he added. “It’s moving on pretty quickly now.”