Mon Sep 14, 2020 4:32 pm
#1796154
I thought another stab at the forum crop growing thread might be of interest, so here goes.
Harvesting arable crops generally happens between mid July and the middle of September, but they all get planted at quite different times.
Winter planted Oilseed Rape for example is planted in mid to late August (and grows for 11 months) whereas Spring planted barley is planted between March and April, and is therefore only growing for around four months.
I’m going to spend a year running through a field of winter wheat.
It can be planted as early as mid September, and as late as February. The upsides to earlier planting is generally a better yield per acre, whereas the downsides are that they cost more to grow because they need more weed and disease control because there’s more time for weeds and disease to compete with them.
Although many farmers do, I don’t cultivate at all, and I plant directly into the previous stubbles, taking care to make sure I grow a good mix of crops, and that I use break crops to allow soil borne pests and diseases to have a break in their life cycles.
Before planting, the field has an application of Glypbosate through a crop sprayer which creates a clean seedbed, and is the last chance to use a safe and non-selective herbicide before the crop is in the ground. I also apply about 5 tonnes of local chicken muck which provides a good source of potash and phosphate.
So, the seed arrives. It’s in 500kg bags, and a typical rate is 160 kgs per hectare. That’s 65 kgs to an area the size of a football pitch.
It gets loaded into the seed drill, and the application rate mechanism is calibrated. This particular shot is actually the photo from last year, hence it’s oats in the hopper, but you can get the drift.
The drill will auto adjust the rate at different speeds, so once you’ve told it you want to do 160 kgs per hectare, that’s what it’ll do at any speed (within reason).
This particular seed drill cultivates the ground just in front of the seeding boot. This means I don’t need ploughs, cultivators, or any post-harvest work at all. I just plant straight into the stubble.
The seed boots wear white quickly on my stoney soil as you can see. This is just one day of use. They’re about £18 each, and there are 15 on my drill.
I plant at about 9kph, and the seed drill is 4.8 metres wide. If I do a good day of 5am to 10 pm I can get 120 acres planted in a day, but that’s pushing it. I’m happy to do 100 acres and get home in good time.
The tractor uses about 350 litres of diesel per day and is 215 bhp. That’s a mid sized tractor these days, and 400 hp isn’t uncommon on some big cultivation equipment.
The technology I’m modern equipment is amazing, and everything is now controlled electronically.
The tractor steers itself in the field using John Deere’s equivalent of SkyDemon, which is called GreenStar. Different accuracy subscriptions can annually be bought, and I pay for what is called SF2, which is mid range, and good enough for planting quite accurately, and gives me an accuracy ‘turn by turn’ of around 3cm. It costs (don’t tell Tim Dawson this...) about £600 per annum.
The drill is set to plant the wheat at about 2 inches depth. As soon as possible after planting we apply a pre-emergence’ herbicide which is a product that acts like an invisible film on the surface of the soil, and allows the wheat to pass through but nothing else.
So, the more smooth and even the seedbed is, the better this product works. This is partially why we carefully roll the seed in, but rolling also presses down any stones (to protect the combine knife in 11 months time) and also creates a better seed to soil contact, and therefore better drought resistance and more even emergence.
Slugs are an issue in wet autumns, but a dry one tends to keep them deeper down and they cause less of an issue.
I’ll update as and when the crop emerges and with regular updates.
C66 will be answering questions as well as myself (won’t you!) so feel free to ask away.
And to prove these aren’t internet pics, here’s your author.
Harvesting arable crops generally happens between mid July and the middle of September, but they all get planted at quite different times.
Winter planted Oilseed Rape for example is planted in mid to late August (and grows for 11 months) whereas Spring planted barley is planted between March and April, and is therefore only growing for around four months.
I’m going to spend a year running through a field of winter wheat.
It can be planted as early as mid September, and as late as February. The upsides to earlier planting is generally a better yield per acre, whereas the downsides are that they cost more to grow because they need more weed and disease control because there’s more time for weeds and disease to compete with them.
Although many farmers do, I don’t cultivate at all, and I plant directly into the previous stubbles, taking care to make sure I grow a good mix of crops, and that I use break crops to allow soil borne pests and diseases to have a break in their life cycles.
Before planting, the field has an application of Glypbosate through a crop sprayer which creates a clean seedbed, and is the last chance to use a safe and non-selective herbicide before the crop is in the ground. I also apply about 5 tonnes of local chicken muck which provides a good source of potash and phosphate.
So, the seed arrives. It’s in 500kg bags, and a typical rate is 160 kgs per hectare. That’s 65 kgs to an area the size of a football pitch.
It gets loaded into the seed drill, and the application rate mechanism is calibrated. This particular shot is actually the photo from last year, hence it’s oats in the hopper, but you can get the drift.
The drill will auto adjust the rate at different speeds, so once you’ve told it you want to do 160 kgs per hectare, that’s what it’ll do at any speed (within reason).
This particular seed drill cultivates the ground just in front of the seeding boot. This means I don’t need ploughs, cultivators, or any post-harvest work at all. I just plant straight into the stubble.
The seed boots wear white quickly on my stoney soil as you can see. This is just one day of use. They’re about £18 each, and there are 15 on my drill.
I plant at about 9kph, and the seed drill is 4.8 metres wide. If I do a good day of 5am to 10 pm I can get 120 acres planted in a day, but that’s pushing it. I’m happy to do 100 acres and get home in good time.
The tractor uses about 350 litres of diesel per day and is 215 bhp. That’s a mid sized tractor these days, and 400 hp isn’t uncommon on some big cultivation equipment.
The technology I’m modern equipment is amazing, and everything is now controlled electronically.
The tractor steers itself in the field using John Deere’s equivalent of SkyDemon, which is called GreenStar. Different accuracy subscriptions can annually be bought, and I pay for what is called SF2, which is mid range, and good enough for planting quite accurately, and gives me an accuracy ‘turn by turn’ of around 3cm. It costs (don’t tell Tim Dawson this...) about £600 per annum.
The drill is set to plant the wheat at about 2 inches depth. As soon as possible after planting we apply a pre-emergence’ herbicide which is a product that acts like an invisible film on the surface of the soil, and allows the wheat to pass through but nothing else.
So, the more smooth and even the seedbed is, the better this product works. This is partially why we carefully roll the seed in, but rolling also presses down any stones (to protect the combine knife in 11 months time) and also creates a better seed to soil contact, and therefore better drought resistance and more even emergence.
Slugs are an issue in wet autumns, but a dry one tends to keep them deeper down and they cause less of an issue.
I’ll update as and when the crop emerges and with regular updates.
C66 will be answering questions as well as myself (won’t you!) so feel free to ask away.
And to prove these aren’t internet pics, here’s your author.
Never criticise a man until you’ve flown a mile in his loafers.