OSR companion crop

Location
Cambridge
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Last one is trial where stubble was left about a foot tall
 
Location
Cambridge
Have had a few patches of serious slug attack on this field. I can report that they are quite happy to eat lentils and fenugreek as well as the OSR. Buckwheat gets left to the end, but they will also eat that when there is nothing else!
 
Location
Cambridge
These species seem to have little or no effect on the flea beetle epidemic. They only really seem interested in the OSR plants.

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In my covers the brassicas are ok, it's the vetches that are really getting hammered. I wonder if they would be better to use next year.
 

York

Member
Location
D-Berlin
we also on 2 differant farms. Somewhere I have even pictures of it before harvest.
it was a little mess at harvest, the cleaned out stuff the farmer spred with a compost spreader on a harvested field as seed for cover crop. Will look at it if I come around.
in 2 weeks there is a day seminar on this topic in France.
We do a pause this year to do some more research & hopefully get more better mixes. For 50+ €, as this are the prices if you go with the French mixes, it has to perform better. Yield wise it was almost 1 t/ha less OSR. Didn't measure the amount of Vetch, with is sold for 1 €/kg. so if you have no herbicides, less other chemicals in spring, have a couple of 100 kg/ha vetch seed to be cleaned out the OSR the ton less per ha is not hurting. But we4 are not there jet. Plan was to do 50 ha, which is more than 5% of his OSR area. He said, this is my R&D on the farm.
But he did now do some drastic approaches with B at planting on OSR, which even scare me. So far his OSR doesn't show any fly, bug or other p"predator" damage, neighbours are already seeing problems and might loose a field here & there of OSR.
York-Th.
 

Andy Howard

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Ashford, Kent
I have no comparison as all companion cropped. We have sprayed once, damage was increasing with warm weather forecast. I will post a picture tomorrow. As York says this needs more research. York will be annoyed with me as I skimped on nutrition. It's on marginal land that is prone to flooding, rabbits, pigeons, slugs, waterlogging etc. So I did not want to spend too much until I knew I had a crop and so had to prioritise. Maybe a mistake. Live and learn.
 
Location
Cambridge
I have no comparison as all companion cropped. We have sprayed once, damage was increasing with warm weather forecast. I will post a picture tomorrow. As York says this needs more research. York will be annoyed with me as I skimped on nutrition. It's on marginal land that is prone to flooding, rabbits, pigeons, slugs, waterlogging etc. So I did not want to spend too much until I knew I had a crop and so had to prioritise. Maybe a mistake. Live and learn.
whats the flea beetle damage on the vetch like compared to the OSR?
 

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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