About this time of year I like to review the past 12 months, both in financial and practical terms, and I have to say so far it’s all positive.

Financial performance has the potential to reach the best return on investment for the previous crop that we’ve seen for a number of years, which is always pleasing and makes board meetings a much more comfortable experience.

With firm forward prices and good-looking crops in the ground – even allowing for some inflated input costs – there’s still potential for a reasonable year to come.

About the author

Keith Challen

Arable Farmer Focus writer

Keith Challen manages 1,200ha of heavy clay soils in the Vale of Belvoir, Leicestershire, for Belvoir Farming Company. Cropping includes wheat, oilseed rape and elderflowers. The farm is also home to the Belvoir Fruit Farms drinks business.

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Although that does sound a little like famous last words, we’ll leave it that I’m feeling bullish in the short term.

In practical terms, the subtle changes to the system – one self-propelled to two trailed sprayers, a Fendt combine and a building repurposed into a larger chemical store – have all had positive results in both financial and output performance.

On the whole, crops look very well. This year, we’ve replaced seed-bed fertiliser in the wheat with a biostimulant seed dressing: Unium Bioscience Tiros.

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So far, there’s no visual difference either above or below ground between it and DAP, so if it yields the same there are potential savings to be made – not to mention the benefits to the crop and the environment.

We’ve also used an inoculant seed dressing from the same company on our winter beans for the first time and the difference in nodulation is incredible – at least double in virtually all samples taken.

It will be really exciting come harvest to see if this results in both a yield uplift and an increase in residual nitrogen for the following crop.

This time last year, Barley super dog had a litter of pups and we kept one – Maizie. Well, Maizie is now a year old and we’ve started training. I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting older or the dogs are getting more intelligent, but she would much sooner watch Amanda Owen and her sheep on television than retrieve a sawdust-stuffed dummy for me out in the field. Mind you, I can see her point.