BASE UK 2019 AGM & Conference
- Thread starter AF Salers
- Start date
- Location
- Buckinghamshire
As hard as I try I just can't get excited by bench marking.
- Location
- In the middle.
I can see where both of you are coming from on this but I get put off a bit when info like on the picture above don't seem to add up. If your fuel usage is down a lot and machinery costs are down a lot why is labour still so high?
- Location
- Top of the Chilterns
The thing that was only referred to in passing by Gary, albeit a couple times, was the variance in the results from the no till group, which he described as "huge" I think.
OK it's a small sample, but I would have thought all excellent farmers. As someone flirting with CA across the farm (beyond my experiments to date), I do find this aspect a bit frightening, particularly given the number of mouths I have to feed.
Having half the farm down to a relatively consistent 1st wheat doing 9.5-10.5t is rather different to doing 7.5t on a quarter of the farm with basically the same inputs, but saving say £100/ha on establishment. I completely get all the principles, and can see for myself the benefit to the soil from my experiments, and am completely converted from that perspective. What I find harder to swallow are the experiments always seem to show as a big red splodge in the middle of my yield maps, and that's without any crop failures (touch wood!)...
Not going to stop experimenting and learning though!
Sorry, a bit off topic.
OK it's a small sample, but I would have thought all excellent farmers. As someone flirting with CA across the farm (beyond my experiments to date), I do find this aspect a bit frightening, particularly given the number of mouths I have to feed.
Having half the farm down to a relatively consistent 1st wheat doing 9.5-10.5t is rather different to doing 7.5t on a quarter of the farm with basically the same inputs, but saving say £100/ha on establishment. I completely get all the principles, and can see for myself the benefit to the soil from my experiments, and am completely converted from that perspective. What I find harder to swallow are the experiments always seem to show as a big red splodge in the middle of my yield maps, and that's without any crop failures (touch wood!)...
Not going to stop experimenting and learning though!
Sorry, a bit off topic.
- Location
- leics/warks border
High variability is inevitable.
A farm that has converted recently will have higher depreciation on the drill and any other kit they may have bought, compared to a farm that has had the gear for a few years,
Last year a farm with a high proportion of spring crops will have suffered badly compered to one with all winter crops. It just depends on where you have got to in your chosen rotation.
A recent convert may have made mistakes that an "old hand" would not have.
Some may have suffered badly from slugs.
The reasons for variation are endless.
A farm that has converted recently will have higher depreciation on the drill and any other kit they may have bought, compared to a farm that has had the gear for a few years,
Last year a farm with a high proportion of spring crops will have suffered badly compered to one with all winter crops. It just depends on where you have got to in your chosen rotation.
A recent convert may have made mistakes that an "old hand" would not have.
Some may have suffered badly from slugs.
The reasons for variation are endless.
- Location
- Top of the Chilterns
Indeed, though was the implication not that the variability was higher in the no till group? Or perhaps I misunderstood.
- Location
- leics/warks border
The implication was that the variability was higher in the notill group.
If you are making a major change to what you do, your finances will be adversely affected.
Would it be optimistic to suggest that the change over is more likely to give poor results than unexpectedly good ones in the early years, so as time goes on the average should get better.
If you are making a major change to what you do, your finances will be adversely affected.
Would it be optimistic to suggest that the change over is more likely to give poor results than unexpectedly good ones in the early years, so as time goes on the average should get better.
SilliamWhale
Member
Nor me. The other thing I'd say is no till farms shouldn't really be getting lower yields - in the early years maybe but you should and could expect your yields to be as good as anyone's if you've got the plants, and that is when the real financial gains come.
SilliamWhale
Member
No reason why you can't have half your farm still in first wheat doing that yield. If starting off will you get crop failures? Probably because your trying something new.
As pointed out, it is a very small cohort and a lot of variability. There will be a lot of variability in a big cohort, but it won't show up so much because big groups will smother this effect more easily. It is still interesting for all that. We had some shockingly bad spring crops these last two years, but as costs are so low, it doesn't matter over much. As Sill says, yields shouldn't be lower with no-till, but as we can't help experimenting, we tank sometimes. We had our two most profitable years the first two years we were in no-till, make of that what you will. (Our figures are in amongst Gary's in the screenshot above)
Lower gross output doesn’t in my experience mean lower yielding or lower gross margin fir individual crops - quite often the opposite in fact
What is inevitable though is a lower rotational gross output as you have more spring crops to make the system sustainable and not a grassweed and pest / disease issue in the making !
As long as your fixed costs are reduced then the lower gross output doesn’t matter and can often be the more profitable business
And it’s profit not output that matters once you get away from a business driven by cash flow to fund a high fixed cost structure heavily financed and big the depreciation business typical of many farm situations
I’m not sure why Garry’s labour figure for no till was so high, I also think his depreciation is too high for a notill farm and output low but I guess that’s becuse his sample group is still quite small at the moment
Maybe it would be better to compare the top 25% notill to the top 25% conventional rather than all notill to the top 25% conventional - to do that he’s going to need a lot more notill farmers submitting data though
Just becuse a farm is notill it doesn’t always follow your a top 25% kind of farm regardless of system !
I don't know the members of the group and how they run their businesses. Purely speculating on the average size of TFF no tillers' farms I'd say the labour was pretty "fixed" on predominantly family units, especially on mixed stock with arable. I don't know of anyone who has laid anyone off because of reduced cultivation. I'm surprised the casual labour bills haven't fallen - no need for students roaring up & down fields all September after harvest turning them brown.
How many members are there in the main no till group @martian @Feldspar ? I'm not just thinking of the Groundswell group. You'd need quite a few no tillers to be able to confidently create sub groups such as the top and bottom 25%.
Personally, I think the slide I posted above still shows how conservation agriculture is about margin, not yield. Now, we just need to work out a way of getting more money for CA produced farm goods instead of merely having a cost advantage. And sustainability.
100% agree with this, and is the focus of my work. I buy wheat from 35 no-till farmers that comprise of select varieties of wheat with premium baking/milling qualities. The varieties have to perform well in the field, but quality is #1. The grain is purchased at a cost of production price, which is set for a year, so we are completely separate from the commodity market. We partnered with ADM Milling, and they now have a premium quality flour, traceable, and openly based on conservation Ag. The cost of production model can be hedged against by the growers so they don’t miss out on commodity market swings. It is the #1 wheat marketing option for our growers. That price model heavily takes into account a 5 year rolling average of yields, which means if there are drought years, their price is higher. Good years, the price is lower. Economic sustainability can go hand in hand with Agronomic sustainability. I’ll leave it to your imagination to see if something like this could benefit no-till UK farmers especially with the political unrest that there is on a number of fronts.
The vast majority of beginner no-tillers do see an initial yield drag. There could be several reasons why agronomically, after all you are totally changing the ecosystem from a meter below to a meter above ground. The land and the farmer both have adaption issues. I do a lot of no-till conversion research with and for growers, and the #1 thing I have to remind them of is net margin vs. yield.
But you are right, finding ways to market premium Ag products is a challenge. I live in winter wheat country. It’s hard enough marketing wheat with higher values. Now that growers have diversified under no-till it has been an even bigger challenge marketing rotational crops like linseed, millet, canola, lentils, chickpeas, amaranth, quinoa, sunflowers, etc & etc. The handling, storage, and processing infrastructure largely isn’t there.
I think @Brisel is spot on as to why labour costs are high. We haven't laid anyone even though they aren't needed for piloting a power-harrow up and down incessantly, we've just give them other things to do about the place. Gary M started his presentation by pointing out his company is called Land Family Business because any farmer with any sense is looking at other businesses that they can operate within the parameters of their farm that brings in cash for the family as well as 'the farm.' Using that spare labour to set these businesses up makes perfect sense
Not sure. There's barely 12 in the Groundswell group. He's hoping to set up a website where BASE members can enter their figures and benchmark against other members and his 'conventional' customers. Work in progress, but some way shy, as you say, of having enough info for top 25% etc
Feldspar
Member
- Location
- Essex, Cambs and Suffolk
Feldspar
Member
- Location
- Essex, Cambs and Suffolk
It's important to learn and update your thinking, but have you not swung your opinion to no-till, back to cultivating and then back to no-till again in the space of not that many years?
- Location
- leics/warks border
Notill is like a jigsaw, until you have certain pieces in place in your mind you can't place others.
Often you need to find yourself in a particular situation or have had certain experiences before the penny can drop on some of the advice you are given.
Often you need to find yourself in a particular situation or have had certain experiences before the penny can drop on some of the advice you are given.
The Palouse Region of Washington & Idaho, US
- Tags
- organic matter