Farmer Diaries (UK): Extremely Wet Weather Slows UK Crop Development

Insight Focus

• It’s been one of the wettest UK winters on record.
• Sugar beets are being planted on light land.
• The mild weather increases the risks of aphid-borne infections. 

What’s Happening on The Farm 

1) Easter came & went (happy Easter) but aside of that, when it has not been raining land work is going on. It hasn’t rained so much in my lifetime. 

Like most, I guess, our wheat area planted is noticeably down on plan, being replaced with spring barley and a slow move to State “bumble & bee” mixes. 

I’ve been to several farmer meetings of one-sort-or-another and there is talk of giving up on parts of 2024 and getting ready for 2025.

New rules about the use of urea have now come into force, we are not allowed to use the product unless there is an inhibitor included. With others, we are running a series of trials to show what happens if the farmer does not apply nitrogen. 

Defra have also said that I cannot put more than 25% of my farm into Sustainable Farming Initiatives, from which I deduce they think their schemes are rubbish. I’m told uptake is about 20%, but when you drill into the numbers it is the very small “hobby” farmers and the very large estates, who probably don’t earn their living from farming as such, that have signed up.

Apart from spring cultivations, pesticide applications have resumed and also nitrogen. In preparation for spring crops, we have been moving organic matter to apply to the fields. 

At What Stage Is Your Crop?

a) Wheat/Rye

We now really have two crops of wheat, those that were sensibly drilled in the autumn and they look ok and late drilled wheat that is going to struggle if it turns dry. If the forecast is as I think it is going to be, warm and dry, yield loss will be extreme on shallow rooted crops. Where the crop is “late” we have been rolling the fields, to conserve moisture (believe it or not) and to encourage tillering. 

Rye, I like rye, looks well. If only the nation would eat either a) more heavy rye bread &/or b) they’d feed more pigs with the grain. Last nitrogen application is going on and then we wait.

b) OSR

Still looking over the hedge, my neighbours crop looks extremely well and is in full flower. Travel 2 miles and a second field on his farm looks awful (and my neighbour is a good farmer). This probably sums up growing this crop. Thinking about it, we are doing our ’25 cropping at the moment, I wonder why a farm can have such extremes and what has to be done to change this?

c) Sugar Beet

The sugar beet processor is taking sugar beet from growers who are still lifting last year’s crop.

Warnings of flying aphids are now out, first aphid was expected on 10th April. This greatly increases the risk of yellow virus & subsequent infections. Who’d grow sugar beet? I read that LSEG think the European crop will be higher this year, by some 2% because of the use of pesticides & rainfall. I think this is rubbish and I’m writing down our yields for exactly the same reasons.

Of note, because it’s the first time I’ve heard of this, there have been a number of reports of sugar beet seed being stolen from farm. The sadness of this is that, somewhere, there is a bent farmer that is happy to take stolen goods. It’s a shame, as farmers are some of the most honest people you’d care to meet and the whole industry is built on that. Perhaps it is a sign of desperation, English agriculture is getting so bad and it is not good for the sugar beet industry here in England.

Gloom over and still being behind, we have just started planting the crop on light land. Heavier land is still very wet underneath and is being treated with care, “well sown is half grown”

d) Others (Maize/SFI etc)

When we have planted the sugar beet we will move onto maize, certainly warm enough to plant today. 

What Big Concerns Do You Have at The Moment?

I know “level playing fields” are not something agriculture has ever enjoyed, one man’s subsidy is another man’s government insurance programme, but as our industry here in the UK is more quickly going broke, I see that the EU has agreed an additional £14/t onto grain sales for their farmers for harvest ’23. I have to ask “at what point will our politicians hear the sound of shot guns going off” – they are very deaf at the moment. Maybe the sun is going down on English farming? 

From a practical basis, a drought must be coming and, where there is no rain” there will be “no grain”.