Farmer Focus: Silver linings of the monsoon season
Andrew Wilson © Angela Waites Photography It’s still a bit soggy. I hope by the time you read this that some fieldwork has recommenced, but “spot the dry field” is a bit challenging in North Yorkshire at the moment.
Two thirds of our sugar beet is still to harvest and the few over-wintered potatoes have been written off.
The clock has ticked on drilling wheat, and with expensive spring seed and low commodity prices, harvest prospects look a bit rubbish.
So where to look for positivity?
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If wet fields are good for anything (other than identifying drainage issues) it is allowing one to escape the farm occasionally, have a few days away, go to a meeting or two, research a topic of interest or crack on with a project that there normally isn’t time for.
We’ve been finding and jetting a few drains, improving our pig sheds, and servicing machinery – if there is one thing that gives me a sense of humour failure in the field, it’s machine breakdowns due to poor winter maintenance.
We’ve now finished outloading our February contracted potatoes. We had had to put some through the washer, but at least that job hasn’t clashed with field work.
They have mostly gone into the factory well and will be followed by our March store imminently. The overdraft will be glad of the relief.
The monsoon winter has been a good opportunity for some training, CPD and extracting value for the levy via the AHDB Monitor Farms which in my experience, are excellent.
The Potato Partnership’s trials work is very interesting too – the challenges of growing the humble spud are not getting less, so technical knowledge and critical analysis is as valuable as it ever was.
I noted at the annual National Register of Sprayer Operators update recently that we potentially have a new clipboard holding visitor to entertain on farm – that of Defra’s new Pesticide Enforcement Officers.
I personally far prefer carrot to stick, but we have little choice in the matter. I guess I’d better go do a self-audit and check that all is well before we get busy, because it will dry up soon, honest.
