Rodney Down: Talk of rain causes a frenzy to clear the diary for fertiliser application

Talk of rain had me in a frenzy. Telephone calls followed to cancel what I had planned for the next day and the diary was clear for fertilising. It was even better I had just gambled and bought some of the old season fertiliser the week before the new prices came out, saving me a massive £5/t ,but it all helps.

So off we went and fertilised the whole grass area of the farm. The villagers always know when it is going to rain because ‘Rodney is out with the pepper pot’ and the drought was coming to an end.

The next day I awoke to look out the window in anticipation of seeing a green and pleasant land with puddles everywhere and guess what? Nothing. If I had a cough and a sneeze we would have had more precipitation.

I am now telling myself at least the fertiliser has been applied for when it does rain, one day.

Cows are now nearly on full winter ration as the grazing grass comes to an end. We have experimented with 5,000 gallons/acre of dirty water via a trailing shoe and it has helped a little so we may do the rest of the grazing this week.

Wessex Gold has now been included into the ration to bulk it up a bit. Saying this we are pleased with our milk yields, with the cows up to now being 2.5 litres per cow per day above last year.

We will also look at doing some whole crop because the maize is looking poor. It will be a last minute decision because we will need every acre of straw in order not to rely on bought-in supplies.

The other option to help the bedding situation out is converting to sand for the cubicles which we are looking at very closely over the next few months.

Happy harvesting, I think barley could be cut in June this year?

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