Returning from a break was made a more pleasurable experience by some rain, meaning everything had grown apace or been saved, depending on soil type.
After last year forced a reset of my previously low-input fungicide approach, the winter wheat is clean and done with treatments, as is the spring barley. We start planning for improvements next year.
The bare patches and blackgrass in an area of heavy land wheat are down to an incredibly wet autumn, leading to large puddles and no chance of spraying. This was only avoidable by hindsight.
See also: Crop Watch: Yellow rust plague in North and OSR pod sealants
About the author
Andy Barr
Andy Barr farms 320ha in mid-Kent, aiming to farm as regeneratively as possible. He stopped ploughing 25 years ago and over this time restructured the business with less land farmed and increased the use of contractors, environmental areas and diversification projects.
My other concern is spring barley establishment after grazed cover crops, and we can do something about that. Simply not grazing is the easiest fix, but we would lose the value of livestock integration.
There was certainly no shortage of rain during our break in Scotland. My ancestors farmed in Lanarkshire and bought their Ayrshire cows down to Kent on the train about 130 years ago.
With breathtaking views around every corner and a truly rural feel compared with the clogged-up South East, I daydreamed about moving back.
Although I like coming across sheep in the road with no need of fences because there is so little traffic, the problem is, my wife gets nervous if she’s not within 15 minutes of some decent shopping opportunities, so finding a sweet spot would be tricky.
Our farming history is relevant to the recently announced Farming Profitability Review.
My great-grandfather managed to first rent a farm in Kent and then make enough money to buy it and set up each of his sons in viable farms across the county.
There is no chance of managing that these days from raising crops and livestock
The line in the review’s terms of reference that mentions “other ancillary activities that farmers can undertake to support profitability” immediately dodges the farming profitability subject and steers us back to what we are already doing: subsidising food production with our own diversification.
