Farmer Focus: Feed wheat price steady ahead of harvest
Jack Bosworth © Tim Scrivener The year is flying along, and by this time next month (first week of August), we will hopefully have winter barley and oilseed rape harvested. The first of the straw should also be in.
Ideally, we will also have got some slurry out and cultivations will be under way. Well, farming is usually that straightforward, isn’t it?
June is typically a bit of a quieter month on the farm for us, but that doesn’t seem to have been the case this year.
See also: New high performing feed wheat available next season
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Ed has been busy with contract spreading, though this is now finished until the autumn.
Another factor has been staff taking annual leave, which has left those working on the farm with higher workloads. And we have a few other development projects on the go as well.
We have been buying in some wheat elsewhere on the pig unit. This is to ensure we have sufficient stock to see us through until we gradually introduce new home-grown crop once it’s been harvested.
To spread risk, we took some for the Norfolk unit earlier on in the year and held off for Spains Hall requirements until recently. The price ranged from £167 to £176/t, so it was relatively consistent.
What has been more volatile recently is farrowing performance. We began June with the first week of farrowings averaging 14.1 born alive a litter, which is still very good, albeit 3.5% below our 12-month average.
However, the last week of June saw us record a whopping 16.8 a litter.
I wish I could explain the reason for this spike, but Alex and Gemma’s approach every week is consistent, whether that be gilt numbers, parity profile, accommodation, or heat checking and routine.
On a personal note, it has been a great month for me since my last piece. I became a married man and enjoyed a long weekend away in Majorca for our “mini-moon”.
Last but not least, our business has been shortlisted as a finalist for the Farmers Weekly Mixed Farmer of the Year award. I’m very much looking forward to showing the judges round in the near future.
I hope everyone has a successful and, more importantly, safe harvest.