Wheat harvesting is making good progress across the southern half of England, and although patchy showers have caused some delays a few growers have already packed up the combine for the year.

Yields from the winter wheat harvest are generally good and reflect the pattern of high yields seen from winter barley and oilseed rape, which is now largely cut in England.

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East

In Norfolk, Barry Garner wrapped up harvest just before the rain at Shrubbery Farm, Carleton Rode, with wheat yielding remarkably well, after the farm suffered from the driest first half of the year for 19 years.

“Dickens has been absolutely brilliant and yielded 12t/ha but there has been more variation between the varieties, and first and second wheats this year,” says Mr Garner.

Gator came in a close second, with Diego and Relay also doing well. He was slightly disappointed in the Relay, because it followed beans and did not do as well as other wheat varieties following oats.

He finished combining Wizard beans on Sunday, and although he was concerned that the crop would suffer from dry conditions the variety yielded 5t/ha.

South West

In Wiltshire, Crusoe milling wheat yielded well but the protein content was not great, according to Edward Parsons at Templemans Farm, Redlynch, near Salisbury.

“It has done well and yielded 11.1-12.3t/ha with bushel weights of 76kg/hl but proteins were low at 11.5-12.5%,” he says.

The variety Revelation is still to cut, and although it looks like it is ready to pop out of the ear, some of the straw is still green.

Spring barley has done very well, with Propino yielding 8.15-8.39t/ha. Oilseed rape averaged a reasonable 3.7t/ha with Harper doing slightly better than Extrovert at 3.9t/ha, and with a very good oil content of 48%.

North

In Yorkshire, Tim Westgarth has finished cutting winter barley and oilseed rape but was yet to make a start on wheat at Holmedale Valley, near Richmond.

He was very happy with his Volume and Cassia winter barley, which both yielded about 10.49t/ha. Oilseed rape yields have been very good, averaging 5.18t/ha, with Incentive doing slightly better than Charger at 5.43t/ha.

Rain has hampered the wheat harvest, but Mr Westgarth was hoping to start at the end of this week.

“We had 33mm of rain on Saturday but the wheat still looks good at the moment, with some potential there,” he says.

South

After severe damage from cabbage stem flea beetles, Brian Shaw was pleasantly surprised with his oilseed rape harvest (pictured above) at Barton Hill Farm, near Luton.

“The field of PR46W21 was hit very badly and I thought it was a write-off but it came back in the spring and has yielded 3.5t/ha,” he says.

The highest-yielding variety was Cabernet, with one field doing outstandingly well at 5t/ha.

He grows 200ha of oilseed rape and says yields were largely down to seed-bed conditions, and the amount of damage from flea beetles, slugs and pigeons.

“I am happy getting 4t/ha, and so have been very pleased this year,” he adds.