Recent content by jon the pom

Gardloc do make one, apparently, but Sparex, who own the patent, do not seem to be able to sell one separately.

.... but if it is difficult & stupidly expensive to replace, it doesn't get done/ Just bought a Gardloc guard (£70ish), but need the biggest (80mm) insert/bearing - but "not available" separately - only in a mixed pack for £80!

I've just bought a large Gardloc guard for my Bomford topper, but the kit did not include the 80mm plastic insert (bearing) that I need, only 3 pairs ranging from 53mm to 69mm. It seems impossible to buy 1 or even the biggest pair. They do offer a kit of 16 or 18 inserts, for £80, which is...

In 2019, we bought a Bateman portable (rotary) catching pen & race for about £3.5k, which we've set up in our yard, connected to our existing crush (£1k?), with a couple of handling gates, (with plenty of string). Seems to do the job for way less than the minimum required spend to get the grant...

Agreed - when I looked at the last round to buy a portable collecting yard (to help with TB testing)~(£3.5k), I found we would have needed to have spent over twice as much on other things, to access the minimum grant.... so cheaper to just buy what we really needed (& can sell again if we stop...

Agreed - when I looked at the last round to buy a portable collecting yard (to help with TB testing)~(£3.5k), I found we would have needed to have spent over twice as much on other things, to access the minimum grant.... so cheaper to just buy what we really needed (& can sell again if we stop...

Thanks again for all the ideas everyone

.... 12" deep is 3" into the red marl, tines, esp on the rotavator, don't last long in the flints, and pneumatic tyres get punctures.... hence we like scratching in with min-til! ... but not for maize in trash?

Thanks everyone - I will continue to look at options over the winter, then decide with my contractor in the spring

.... We have red marl clay 10-12" (sorry 250 - 300 mm) down, & quite aggressive flints (the chalk is some 10-20 ft below that)

It was the maize's lack of competitiveness at the start that worries me about the Regen Agric approach. Perhaps use the sheep first, as suggested elsewhere.

Thanks, I think this could work for us.

Thanks - This clever combination is probably great on deep, stone free top soils, but I'd be wary on our shallow flinty Chilterns soils

I'm dabbling in Regen Agric - as it may provide "public goods" for ELMS. As we no longer drill OSR after Rye silage, our next crop will be maize next spring. This seemed a good chance to try a "Diverse Cover Crop" so got Cotswold Seeds to supply a mix i/c vetch, forage rape, stubble turnip...

Thanks, & agree about lack of power, but certainly v. stable. We don't use it for too much hauling work, still have a loader tractor for that (bit extravagant, but getting too old to mess about!) Seems electrics is a problem with the Scorpion. We had trouble with the 3rd service on the boom...