Wet ‘n’ dry. Very dry. Brewster Farms’ late spring and summer experience will be familiar to that of many UK farmers.

“For us, 2026 has definitely been a tale of two halves,” says Matt Brewster.

“Because we’ve been pretty much farming a desert since the middle of June, we forget how wet it was up until that point. Prior to the Cereals Event in early June, all the crops were looking fantastic. And, due to those ideal warm, damp conditions in April/May, we had a huge first-cut of grass.”

See also: Driver’s view: Mark Tiplady’s Volvo L70H loading shovel

Indeed, that monster grass cut resulted in the first major Brewster fleet change since our initial visit to Bickford Grange Farm back in April.

The firm’s Valtra T215 and 3m wide buckrake were struggling to cope with the extra volume of crop at the clamp, so Matt went in search of a shovel.

Eventual source was South Wales JCB dealer JE Lawrence, which supplied a 23-plate, 2,000-hour Farm Master 435S at £135,000, a saving on new of about £70,000.

Outed was Brewster’s six-year-old TM320S pivot-steer tele, on 4,000 hours, for around £60,000.

Matt Brewster © Andrew Faulkner

“It’s been a big success. Fitted with a 4.2m folding buckrake, the 15t shovel has much more output, consolidates better and, despite its physical size, is actually more manoeuvrable on awkward clamps than the tractor and front buckrake. Basically, the clamp is no longer our bottleneck,” says Matt.

“Downside is that we miss the second telescopic for straw stacking, loading lorries and pallet work around the yard. Then again, the shovel is better for loading spreaders with muck and sludge cake.”  

The new McHale Fusion 4 baler wrapper was another star performer from this grass season, rolling up 10,000 bales of silage, hay and haylage without drama.

Of those 10,000, 6,000 bales were made in May during the phenomenal crop growth period, with Brewster getting through its usual early-bought six pallets of wrap within the month; those six pallets would normally last until much later in the season.

Sadly, the change in the weather from mid-June meant second-cut was sparse, and third-cut won’t happen.

Of the other grass kit’s performance, again it was largely trouble-free – except for a UJ in the Claas Jaguar 860’s feeder housing driveline.

Initial thinking was this would mean a day’s downtime and a tedious drive to Claas’s HQ at Saxham to get the part. But, to help out, local Claas dealer Morris Corfield managed to arrange a demo 950 forager for them within hours.

“It was a classic case of a dealer turning a problem into a positive,” explains Matt. “It also highlighted how the tech, output and ease of maintenance have moved on from our 10-year-old 860. So, we’ll probably be looking to upgrade to a two-year-old 950, with dry matter and yield recording, for next season.”

Cereal harvest

As for many around the country, Brewster’s autumn-sown combinable crop yields were average – 4-4.5t/ha OSR, 7.4t/ha winter barley, 6-11t/ha winter wheat – whereas the spring barley and spring beans were poor, down at 5t/ha and 2.5t/ha, respectively. In contrast, all straw yields have been heavy.

 “It’s just a reflection of the year. In June, crops had tillered out and were thick, hence the good straw yields. But the complete absence of any rain in the second half of June and July meant there was no grain fill, so disappointing grain yields.”

At 5,000 straw bales plus, the upside is that the firm’s MF 2270 big baler pumped out around 1,000 bales more than in a ‘normal’ season, and, with values at £90-£100/t ex field, straw has been a decent earner in 2026.

Machine arrivals

In addition to the already mentioned Farm Master shovel, other new arrivals extend to a tractor, two cultivators, a telehandler and a pickup.

General tractor policy is to keep the Valtras for three years/5,000 hours and then move them on before they run out of warranty.

The 215hp T215’s time was up, so it was chopped in at local dealer Edwards & Farmer for a new 305hp Q305, with the increase in horsepower down to Brewster renting another 145ha.

The two 22-plate T195s are on 5,500 hours and out of warranty. But past performance has persuaded Matt to postpone their replacement until 2027.

“If we’d achieved 10t/ha of wheat across the board this harvest, the 195s would have gone,” says Matt. “However, with the extra ground, there were other spending priorities.”

This JCB 435S replaced a 20-plate TM320S pivot-steer © Andrew Faulkner

Top of the shopping list was tillage kit, which has been a particular focus. Incoming is a new mounted 3m Sumo Trio disc/leg cultivator from TR Machinery (£23,000), as well as a second-hand 4m trailed Simba SL supplied by Warwickshire-based Amtec, with the SL being a direct swap for Brewster’s existing 4m mounted Horsch Terrano FX.

“We were struggling to get the mounted Terrano into this year’s baked ground. It needed something heavier, and that’s why we went for the trailed SL.”

Again, in a nod to this year’s conditions, cultivation speed has been reined back to 9kph to be kinder on the machines and reduce the risk of frame failure.

“The soil is remarkably friable given the lack of moisture, although this is probably as much down to natural cracking as anything achieved by our SL and TerraTech.”

‘New’ 17,000-mile D-Max arrived for about £23,000 © Andrew Faulkner

Still to arrive on farm at the time of our visit, a like-for-like deal has been agreed on the farm’s now only telescopic – a 73-plate, 2,600-hour JCB Loadall 542-70.

The new model will come from JCB dealer John Bownes at a cost-to-change of £35,000. “We tried the hydrostatic Kramer and Claas Scorpion machines, but we’re torque converter people.

The guys all said they preferred the JCB, both in terms of operation and comfort, so that’s what we’ve gone for. Price-wise, there wasn’t much in it.”

Lastly, Matt’s 2-litre Discovery 5 is up for sale, largely because its steering rack has failed so it’s currently a non-runner. Land Rover quoted £5,000 to complete the repair, along with a three-month wait.

Not much good to Matt, who needs to be mobile. He has already sourced a 17,000-mile, 24-plate Isuzu D-Max V-Cross from Exeter-based Vospers at £23,000 plus VAT, and, critically, the D-Max comes with a five-year/125,000-mile warranty.

Ongoing issues

Fluctuating fuel prices and availability of wearing metal are high up on Matt’s list of ongoing concerns. Over the past six months he has paid between 58p and £1.15/litre for red diesel, and, with the forager guzzling a daily 1,000 litres, this clearly makes a huge difference to the bottom line.

“Thankfully, our fuel surcharge on anything over 70p/litre has worked well, and, most importantly, our customers seem to understand and accept the need for it,” he says. 

“Because we’re buying in around 10,000 litres a week, the risk is spread. And, at this quantity, we’re often buying at a 3-4p/litre lower rate than our customers, anyway. Another plus is that, with the crops being so dry, we reckon the combine was cutting an extra 12-15ha for every tank of fuel.”

Tyre manufacturing faults have been a recent issue. Some have been swapped out © Andrew Faulkner

As for wearing metal, Matt booked his requirement early but says that dealer stocks are already running low and will be increasingly difficult to get hold of through the season.

Though drill parts could be an issue, it’s the Simba SL and TerraTech Multi-Cut points that are of more immediate concern, with wear rates reckoned to be 20-30% higher than in an “average” year.

And what about fertiliser ordering for his in-house farming operation? While many have opted to spread the risk with a buy-little-and-often approach through the purchasing season, Matt has so far resisted the temptation to commit, in part due to a lack of on-farm storage until some of his grain is shifted.

Taken to its extreme, Matt’s buy-late policy has occasionally seen product arrive on farm for spreading three days’ later. Even he concedes that this was too tight a turnaround and not something he’s planning to repeat.

Kit list

The 4m Vaderstad Rapid could make way for a 6m 600S © Andrew Faulkner

• Tractors: Valtra Q305 x2, Valtra T235 x2, Valtra T195 x4 and 1968 MF135
• Combine: Claas Lexion 760TT with 10.7m header
• Forager: Claas Jaguar 860 with grass pick-up, eight-row Orbis maize header and 5.2m Disco wholecrop header
• Handlers: JCB 542-70 telehandler and JCB Farm Master 435S shovel
• Sprayer: Sands Horizon 5500 (5,500-litre/36m)
• Spreader: Amazone ZA-TS 4200 fertiliser spreader 
• Drills: Horsch Pronto (4m), Horsch Xpress KR (4m), Vaderstad Rapid 400S (4m), Amazone p/harrow drill (3m), Vaderstad Tempo maize drill (8-row), Amazone KG 5002-2 power harrow with grass seeder (5m)
• Cultivation kit: Sumo Trio (3m), Simba SL (4m), TerraTech Multi-Cut (3m) disc/leg cultivator, Vӓderstad Carrier (6.5m), Weaving stubble rake (7m), 6f Amazone Cayros plough x2
• Grass kit: Claas Liner 3600 four-rotor rake, Krone Swadro 880 two-rotor rake, Claas Volto 900 tedder, MF TD776 tedder, McHale front/rear butterfly mower (9.6m), McHale rear trailed/front mounted mower (6.4m), McHale Fusion 4 round baler/wrapper, MF 2270 big square baler (120x90cm)
• Muck kit: 12t Ktwo 1200 Duo rear-discharge spreaders x2, 12m Mastek dribble bar, 17,500-litre Conor tanker with 8m dribble bar
• Trailers: 18t Richard Western x3, 18t Kane, 18t Larrington