Farmer Focus: Neighbour’s straw averts bedding shortage

The big question looming over me back in June was whether we would have enough straw to last us until harvest. And this included putting all top bales through the straw chopper.

By the time the combines started rolling around us, in the second week of July, we had just two weeks’ worth of straw left.

I normally have enough to see us through September, but last year wasn’t a normal year and this year was certainly worse.

See also: Contractor Comment: Summer scorcher sets off baling frenzy

About the author

William de Feyter

William de Feyter and his wife Sarah run a 4,800-grower pig enterprise on rented grassland across three units in Norfolk. They rear five-week weaners to store weight, mainly in tents, plus 450 indoors, with up to 160 smalls taken to finishing weight, all on straw. They also have an 80-ewe flock.

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Our bale size of choice is a 120x90cm square bale for ease of carting, stacking and so on, and our annual requirement is about 800t. This is normally quite achievable off 202ha (500 acres).

On winter barley, we would normally expect 3-4 bales/acre. We had some fields on better land achieve this, then we had other fields barely manage 1 bale/acre.

We decided to switch to a round baler for a couple of fields, as there wasn’t a big enough swath to keep the square baler full enough to form a bale.

Not an ideal situation for ourselves or the contractors involved in the baling, but a combination of light land and drought meant the straw simply wasn’t there.

Cue a phone call to a neighbour, who kindly agreed to sell us a further 28ha (70 acres) of wheat straw.

The wheat straw was an altogether different experience and perhaps our saviour.

While the odd field yielded just 2 bales/acre, the vast majority produced on average 4 bales/acre, with some up to 6 bales/acre, which was exceptional and quite a relief.

I am pleased to say we have the straw we require and perhaps the only consolation of being in a drought situation is that we haven’t had to turn/ted any straw this year, which is a first for us.

The baling contractors we use have once again done an excellent job battling tiny fields, small swaths and rock-solid tramlines to get us where we need to be.

Every year I question whether we could justify our own baler, but having watched them lump through tramlines at speed and chase acres for a small amount of straw, I am quite happy to pay a fixed price per bale and let them get on with it while we concentrate on the carting.