Will Tom Rawson’s maize perform under plastic?

This spring has certainly been a mixed bag for our farms spread between Wrexham and Market Rasen. The farm in Lincolnshire has had the best grass growth against budget and, as a result, we are still turning into 3,000kg/DM covers and have half the platform out for silage, with third cut scheduled for the middle of the month. We have weekly involvement in five dairy farms, all in different counties and comparing growth rates has certainly been interesting, the poorest growth has been on the organic farm – talking to other OMSco members, it seems it has not been the spring not to use artificial N.

The main argument at our budget session this March was whether or not to put the maize under plastic. At this stage, the decision to opt for the polytunnel effect is paying off, with some plants standing at six foot on the first of the month. The benchmark is our neighbour’s crop, drilled in the open, so I will keep you informed as the results come in.

July has seen our annual student swap – thanks and good luck go to Freddie and Lizzie from Harper and a warm welcome goes out to John and Amy. A scary fact is that these nineteen-year-olds will by the end of the year have spent 5% of their lives working for Evolution Farming. John is joining us from Aberystwyth. This will please Mike, as he his getting sick of all this Harper talk.