Kildare grower Jonny Greene started his harvest this week moving into Tower winter barley which showed a “disappointing” yield but reasonable quality.

He kicked off combining on Monday afternoon (July 18) on his Irish farm with early yields from barley coming in at 8.2t/ha compared with last year’s 8.6t/ha.

Jonny Greene, harvesting winter barley in south Kildare Ireland

At Levitstown Farms in south Kildare, about 30 miles south west of Dublin, his light soils suffered from dry weather in late May and early June while the farm saw very low levels of sunshine.

“We are seeing disappointing yields from the early crop, well down on average,” he tells Farmers Weekly.

See also: Harvest 2016: Winter barley harvest gets going on the Suffolk Brecklands

Grain specific weight is coming in at about 63kg/hl with a moisture content off the combine at 17%.

He is growing about 48ha of winter barley on the farm’s 340ha of arable area, and had been anticipating a good harvest with large barley ears before the dry weather hit.