Steve Heard: Holiday allows time to realise home is not a bad place to be

Farming heavy soils in east Leicestershire can often have its downsides, but in times of drought it’s not a bad place to be. Last season we ignored advice to delay drilling, certainly early sown and consequently best rooted crops are still looking the best.

Again I am reading advice to consider a later delayed drilling to help the fight against black-grass, but surely getting the best crop establishment is the ultimate start to any battle against weeds (and potential drought).

We have now ordered Nufol liquid nitrogen for all our Gallant milling wheat. After much consideration, I decided even though the existing nitrogen will undoubtedly be less diluted due to a lower potential yield, but having come this far, to cut corners and risk missing a decent premium would seem foolish.

By the time you read this I hope to have completed T3 applications, again having stuck to the original planned strobulurin mix, having decided not to take any risks.

Perhaps it is a sign of age, but I do seem to be more risk averse, for the first time I have taken an insurance policy for my OSR crops against hail damage.

Even though I intend to swath all but a couple of hundred acres, this new ‘black gold’ is far too valuable to lose at the final hurdle. In the same vein, we are fitting further extension socks to the combine unloading augers so there is no excuse for any spillage.

It’s now several weeks and a number of machine washes since we stock piled the chicken manure from a neighbouring farm, but still the scent seems to haunt me.

This is our first experience with a poultry muck fertiliser and I await the analysis results with interest, application rates can then be decided.

Post-harvest weather permitting, spreading will be used as a kick start for OSR both on heavier land and particularly where we border a neighbour’s partridge release pen. Let’s hope the odour might help persuade them to graze somewhere else.

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