Harvest is here, and this is what I think of it.

Newsletter #17

Harvest 2024 is progressing across the UK and after the growing season from hell, I think all concerned will just be happy to get whatever yields are out there safely into the grainstore.

This is harvest No26 for me and here are a few thoughts on what I am seeing on the ground and on social media regarding this end to 23/24 crops.

I ran a Twitter poll last week (find it here), asking my followers what their early thoughts were on how harvest was performing so far….

Light land farmers are seeing better results then others it seems, with 33% reporting harvest is better then expected - compared to 22% and 23% of medium and heavy land farmers. I expect lighter land has drained better, during the wettest times and not droughted out this year either.

Heavy land farmers report being the most disappointed overall, with 32% saying harvest was proving to be worse then they expected.

Talking with farmers, the poll certainly mirrors the conversations I am having. But the common theme across businesses is the fact the poor parts of fields, headlands, blocked drains etc etc have been terrible - this season has proved to show any kink in the system.

Thinner crops / parts of fields also seem to have let grass weeds through and take over - perfect season for BG I suspect? Ergot also seems to be a massive problem is the majority of wheat crops. If this is the case with you, try and create a plan. See who can colour sort it and at what cost etc.

How have things been for you? I would love to read your thoughts, email me back or comment on the twitter post 👍

I have noticed on various social media platforms, that more farm businesses then ever seem to be documenting their harvest activities in the form of daily videos etc. Some of these are very high quality and obvious aren’t cheap to produce, others are capturing good footage from their phone and simply editing. Both are telling the farm’s story though, and that is the power of sharing content about harvest.

I have no doubt that these farms will see very useful returns from putting their business on online and growing a following, returns that aren’t necessarily obvious at first glace. But for instance, when they want to recruit or start selling produce D2C etc - they have an audience there ready to go. Very clever imho.

James Peck’s youtube channel is proving to be very popular with 12,000+ subscribers now and I expect a que of students that want to work for him next summer…..Well done James! Superb stuff!

Although some fields are still carrying more moisture then normal right now, it does seem that cultivations are generally taking place in superb conditions and many farms pushing on with mole draining.

I would suggest that the humble spade will be a well used tool this summer, to determine cultivation depths, checking the mole is forming well and to see how far down crops actually rooted this season!

Cover crop drilling has progressed nicely with several farms I am involved with, very satisfying seeing these go into great conditions know how well they can help the soil recover from a pounding this season!

Here is the calculator I use to determine an approx end date to harvest -

Harvest Calculator 

Personally, I use simple calculators a lot. By working out an approx finish date for certain operations you can then work backwards and see if it fits in with everything else that is going on. If the end date is for example a week earlier then you had originally thought, you now have a whole team with an extra week to use - that could be a bit more time off then planned or starting other jobs earlier and cracking on with those etc.

It is just about being aware of whats going on. If you don’t have a rough date to work with, I struggle to see how you can be seriously planning everything else that comes after harvest!

Download here 

All the best for the coming week - I hope all goes well and please do reach out if you want to chat about anything at all.

Thanks for reading, take care

Ben