Thankfully, and as the autumn closes in, most of the autumn cereals are in the ground for another year.

With a mid-September start we managed to get ahead of the rain, which meant we had a good proportion of land sown in excellent conditions by the end of September.

While I appreciate that this tactic is nowhere near satisfactory for many, especially those of you with the dreaded blackgrass to contend with, it is a must on our light land to ensure that we have well-rooted crops capable of meeting the challenges of the spring drought. 

See also: Video: Good early sugar beet yields as harvesting speeds up

About the author

Andrew Blenkiron

Arable Farmer Focus writer

Andrew Blenkiron manages the 4,400ha Euston Estate, south of Thetford. Principal farm enterprises are combinable and root crops, including sugar beet. In addition the estate supports let land, sheep, outdoor pigs, poultry, suckler cows, horses and stewardship.

Read more articles by Andrew Blenkiron

All of that being said, there are still a few fields to follow later-harvested potatoes, forage maize and sugar beet, which will need to go in come what may.

I do hope they don’t realise the challenges of the last two autumns.

Of course, as we all know, this is just the start of the growing challenge. Next, we have to be able to justify the inputs that go into getting them as far as next summer.

Time to break out those old cost-benefit calculators for nitrogen fertiliser that we ran all those years ago.

Thankfully, we had an element of our artificial nitrogen forward-purchased and of course there will be masses of AD digestate in the tanks by the spring.

With regard to the other variable costs, it is down to good group purchasing (hopefully) by our local buying group. 

Please do look out for farming’s entry at the City of London Lord Mayor’s show around the streets of London on November 13.

The Worshipful Company of Farmers will lead the charge to promote British food and farming to the masses on the streets and on BBC TV.

As you would expect, no one organisation can pull off this major feat alone.

This year support is greatly appreciated from New Holland, with a methane-powered tractor and a forage harvester, the NFU along with its young ambassadors, Surrey Docks City Farm with its even younger team, Red Tractor with its not-so-young farmers, and Mark Bayley Ltd with its dairy equipment.

Our thanks must go to all for their determined effort to promote what we do.