Arable Farming

With growers starting to harvest wheat crops, specific weights are holding up well, while there is some concern about protein levels - although it is early days.

A research project in the USA exploring the feasibility of vertically farmed wheat has found yields of 39 tonnes per hectare could be achieved within just 70 days when grown under optimum artificial conditions.

Yields of both winter barley and winter oilseed rape are highly variable, both within and between farms.

A public consultation into post-Brexit regulation of precision breeding techniques such as gene editing (GE), will take place this autumn Government has announced.

The characteristics that make up the best performing cereal farms in England have been explored using data from Defra’s Farm Business Survey.

Symptoms of what is believed to be stem rust disease were found in untreated plots of winter wheat at four sites at Oak Park Crop Research Centre in Carlow, Ireland last week.

Industry leaders have called for Government to provide ‘critical’ data on the UK’s figure for access to seasonal workers, in a bid to prevent labour shortfalls.

Several grain merchants including ADM and Frontier have announced they will no longer be sending grain samplers on to farms, following growing concerns over health and safety.

While participating in the LiveWheat project, Green Acres Farm in Shropshire has shown resilience in extreme weather and achieved consistent wheat crop quality and yield. Farmers Guardian spoke to organic grower, Mark Lea.

As pest control and extreme weather put sugar beet crops under pressure, BBRO’s online BeetField20 Virtually Live events provided growers with some pointers to adapting to the changing meteorological and political climate.