Self propelled to Trailed

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
Sound like typical contract farming heroes.

Undercut everyone to get the job. Then don't have time to stop for a p!$$
We only do about 600hrs a year in the sprayer we are not pushed at all. It’s just how I work, I crack on because it means I can get finished quicker. I have no interest in stopping for an hour for lunch and an hour for coffee breaks throughout the day. It’s nothing about being a contract farming hero.
 
It things are so tight you cannot stop for a toilet break and you have to run across the yard with chemical cans, apart from raising an initial smile, it's a bit sad. I'd sooner be greeted with the sight of a cup of tea being brought out into the yard than someone running with an armful of chemical cans!
I was thinking same ,the thought of great holes cut in hedges too , ?? and bet he has those special nozzles ,where you look across field and think ,look at that soft twit ,spraying in this ,and does his wife come with ice cream ,when she hears you in yard ,filling up , always pour a drink when filling up ,5 minutes to do paper work ,and write next postit note for next load ,
If he has to run across yard with chems , ? dont tell him its much easier to move chem store ,next to water tank ,
Maybe some on a smaller scale ,but do you switch off if you find or see a plovers or oyster catchers nest ,?
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
I was thinking same ,the thought of great holes cut in hedges too , ?? and bet he has those special nozzles ,where you look across field and think ,look at that soft twit ,spraying in this ,and does his wife come with ice cream ,when she hears you in yard ,filling up , always pour a drink when filling up ,5 minutes to do paper work ,and write next postit note for next load ,
If he has to run across yard with chems , ? dont tell him its much easier to move chem store ,next to water tank ,
Maybe some on a smaller scale ,but do you switch off if you find or see a plovers or oyster catchers nest ,?
Things are not tight at all, it’s just how I work. Like I said I wouldn’t expect an employee to do it how I do it. Can’t believe how upset people are getting over this.
 
Things are not tight at all, it’s just how I work. Like I said I wouldn’t expect an employee to do it how I do it. Can’t believe how upset people are getting over this.
Not getting upset ,just a bit of poking and leg pulling ?
Can i swap with you for a day , ?
Any way going to finish my 4 in 1 bucket scrap heap challenge ,and look at my wall and see if still stood ,and take you some pic sof some beach like sand with a horrible crop of barley in it to make you smile
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
Not getting upset ,just a bit of poking and leg pulling ?
Can i swap with you for a day , ?
Any way going to finish my 4 in 1 bucket scrap heap challenge ,and look at my wall and see if still stood ,and take you some pic sof some beach like sand with a horrible crop of barley in it to make you smile
And we have 12m gateways in order to get the combine and drills through without having to fold up 10 times a day.
 
I have been reading this thread with interest, I have a mate who runs a big new Horsch sprayer on about 2500 acres and he does not have to justify this to anybody, especially bods on here. @Banana Bar go and buy whatever makes you and your sprayer operator happy!!
by the way I run a SP and wouldn't go back to a trailed one..

I have said this to people for years. Often dairy farmer clients.

I can't justify X or Y they would say.

Their argument is a very weak one in my view. The majority of them, take few holidays, work 7 days a week often, work far more than 45 hours a week and rarely do any DIY or spend big on personal projects, cars or the like. The justification then for anything machinery or infrastructure related is easy. If you are sat in the seat hours at a time day after day then have whatever you want.

Life is too short to beggar about. And I believe that the human element of businesses today is absolutely critical. Get what the operator wants.
 

Chae1

Member
Location
Aberdeenshire
Things are not tight at all, it’s just how I work. Like I said I wouldn’t expect an employee to do it how I do it. Can’t believe how upset people are getting over this.
Could you not pee when you stop to fill up?

I must be getting old, but for some reason I seem to need a pee everytime i fill sprayer. Must be the running water.

I used to pee off side of tractor in Australia when drilling, cultivating. Was a cat crawler so platform at side to stand on.
 
@Feldspar if you've selected the most efficient shiny machinery and plotted the best approach on the ground and a pragmatic approach to logistics, then the physical aspects of your business, the travelling between sites, the infield obstacles are what are causing the lack of output, there's not much more you can do is there??
I have a ring fenced farm with a 18.5ha average field size and only a third of those with any infield obstructions, a third of those have been mitigated by stewardship or orientation
The rest is getting out of bed, and making sure Chem's on site and the cropping's planned efficiently and the machines maintained

If you are still not happy then you have to accept that's one of the constraints of your business, then maybe not shouldering that responsibility alone is what needs addressing, another backup driver or bowser support is what needs considering, travelling between farms is a huge killer of output.

I used to work myself silly, fert at night and early morning, spray during the day on 1250ha of spraying and fert through a RB35 on a high input system, I now have a grossly over capacity 6GS which I'll keep for a long time and I'll spend more time with my family and only spray in good conditions, but I still plan with the same attitude to output, it's natural but I don't have the pressure on myself now and that's ultimately what a sustainable business is about in my opinion.

PS, I don't care if my sprayer choice nets my owner an extra Porsche ( they wouldn't care about such materialistic belongings )
They do care about a sustainable profitable business with happy employees though, they also don't care about how many hectares I spray in a day, that pressure is entirely mine...

I don't want to carry on being responsible for dragging this off topic, so will just say this briefly.

I, like you, have spent a lot of time on sprayers at weird times of day. I can do it and have done it and still do it occasionally, but I made a very conscious decision recently to set our system up so that I could get a normal amount of sleep most of the time. I get a bit grumpy if I don't and it makes me not enjoy farming. I decided I am fortunate enough not to have to run myself ragged, especially if it means I dislike doing a job that I normally love. I've got all the work done I needed to do this season pretty much on time. Maybe only two days late on 15% percent of the wheat.

I've also thought about why this season's output might not have been higher. I think a big thing, which happened a few years ago when direct drilling more with smaller drills going in different locations, is the way the cropping is spread. Because of the autumn we all had, we have winter wheat intermingled with spring wheat and spring barley that should have been winter wheat. We have half fields that should have been winter barley which are now half beans and half oats. Even individual wheat blocks are at different growth stages due to the spread of drilling dates. This is in huge contrast to last season where we could go out and spray hundreds of acres of wheat on the same day and have the timing pretty much spot on on all of it. It's just the year, but I think the right thing to at least be sensitive the growth stages of each field. Yes, maybe compromise the timing a bit to get bigger spraying blocks, but I'm not going to spray wheat when the flag is not out just because the neighbouring field is ready so that I can feel good about how many acres I sprayed that day.

One thing I will sit down and do is run through our Topcon field records and look at the different field efficiencies of different fields sizes and shapes. I've just averaged our winter wheat field areas this year and it's 8.5 ha. On top of the above sporadic locations of the wheat, it happens to fall in a lot of small fields, which obviously doesn't help.

I'm pleased you are in a position where your employer allows you to make the best use of your judgement and skills without feeling overwhelmed. A farm I know of has employed a spray operator off a much bigger operation nearby which, AFAIK, just drove them into the ground with the hours they were expected to do. Much happier in his new job from what I hear.
 

AndrewB

Member
Location
Kincardineshire
Could you not pee when you stop to fill up?

I must be getting old, but for some reason I seem to need a pee everytime i fill sprayer. Must be the running water.

I used to pee off side of tractor in Australia when drilling, cultivating. Was a cat crawler so platform at side to stand on.
I’m the same pee every time I fill, but I’ve only a 4000 l tank, would take me half the day to empty a 8000l tank in small fields, so maybe need a comfort break once half the tank was empty!!
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
Could you not pee when you stop to fill up?

I must be getting old, but for some reason I seem to need a pee everytime i fill sprayer. Must be the running water.

I used to pee off side of tractor in Australia when drilling, cultivating. Was a cat crawler so platform at side to stand on.
I don’t pee on the move!
 

T Hectares

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Berkshire
I don't want to carry on being responsible for dragging this off topic, so will just say this briefly.

I, like you, have spent a lot of time on sprayers at weird times of day. I can do it and have done it and still do it occasionally, but I made a very conscious decision recently to set our system up so that I could get a normal amount of sleep most of the time. I get a bit grumpy if I don't and it makes me not enjoy farming. I decided I am fortunate enough not to have to run myself ragged, especially if it means I dislike doing a job that I normally love. I've got all the work done I needed to do this season pretty much on time. Maybe only two days late on 15% percent of the wheat.

I've also thought about why this season's output might not have been higher. I think a big thing, which happened a few years ago when direct drilling more with smaller drills going in different locations, is the way the cropping is spread. Because of the autumn we all had, we have winter wheat intermingled with spring wheat and spring barley that should have been winter wheat. We have half fields that should have been winter barley which are now half beans and half oats. Even individual wheat blocks are at different growth stages due to the spread of drilling dates. This is in huge contrast to last season where we could go out and spray hundreds of acres of wheat on the same day and have the timing pretty much spot on on all of it. It's just the year, but I think the right thing to at least be sensitive the growth stages of each field. Yes, maybe compromise the timing a bit to get bigger spraying blocks, but I'm not going to spray wheat when the flag is not out just because the neighbouring field is ready so that I can feel good about how many acres I sprayed that day.

One thing I will sit down and do is run through our Topcon field records and look at the different field efficiencies of different fields sizes and shapes. I've just averaged our winter wheat field areas this year and it's 8.5 ha. On top of the above sporadic locations of the wheat, it happens to fall in a lot of small fields, which obviously doesn't help.

I'm pleased you are in a position where your employer allows you to make the best use of your judgement and skills without feeling overwhelmed. A farm I know of has employed a spray operator off a much bigger operation nearby which, AFAIK, just drove them into the ground with the hours they were expected to do. Much happier in his new job from what I hear.
Spot on...
This year's T2's were sprayed this week, I had a couple of 5.30 starts to finish by 10.00 before it was too warm, I then went back on when it cooled in the evening until 10.00pm, a few days and nights like this and it was all done in the least stress to the crop and I enjoyed doing the best job i can, there's nothing better than an early morning misty start before a hot day !! when I used to have to work all season like that to cover everything is when it starts to wear me down, I managed 10 years of SP driving clocking up to 1100hrs one year, eventually I started to question how much of my life was being devoted to sitting on a Sprayer and it become a chore, I now enjoy spraying again and my focus is on achieving the best results rather than covering big acres.

Dropping liquid fert was also a big plus for me, it's meant less unsocial hours spent out trying to avoid scorch and makes better use of there being two of us here.
 

Banana Bar

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Bury St Edmunds
I don't want to carry on being responsible for dragging this off topic, so will just say this briefly.

I, like you, have spent a lot of time on sprayers at weird times of day. I can do it and have done it and still do it occasionally, but I made a very conscious decision recently to set our system up so that I could get a normal amount of sleep most of the time. I get a bit grumpy if I don't and it makes me not enjoy farming. I decided I am fortunate enough not to have to run myself ragged, especially if it means I dislike doing a job that I normally love. I've got all the work done I needed to do this season pretty much on time. Maybe only two days late on 15% percent of the wheat.

I've also thought about why this season's output might not have been higher. I think a big thing, which happened a few years ago when direct drilling more with smaller drills going in different locations, is the way the cropping is spread. Because of the autumn we all had, we have winter wheat intermingled with spring wheat and spring barley that should have been winter wheat. We have half fields that should have been winter barley which are now half beans and half oats. Even individual wheat blocks are at different growth stages due to the spread of drilling dates. This is in huge contrast to last season where we could go out and spray hundreds of acres of wheat on the same day and have the timing pretty much spot on on all of it. It's just the year, but I think the right thing to at least be sensitive the growth stages of each field. Yes, maybe compromise the timing a bit to get bigger spraying blocks, but I'm not going to spray wheat when the flag is not out just because the neighbouring field is ready so that I can feel good about how many acres I sprayed that day.

One thing I will sit down and do is run through our Topcon field records and look at the different field efficiencies of different fields sizes and shapes. I've just averaged our winter wheat field areas this year and it's 8.5 ha. On top of the above sporadic locations of the wheat, it happens to fall in a lot of small fields, which obviously doesn't help.

I'm pleased you are in a position where your employer allows you to make the best use of your judgement and skills without feeling overwhelmed. A farm I know of has employed a spray operator off a much bigger operation nearby which, AFAIK, just drove them into the ground with the hours they were expected to do. Much happier in his new job from what I hear.

Think I know who you mean, does a bit of lorry driving as well?
 

Boomerang

Member
This is really aimed at our spraying God above. Apologies to everyone else if this appears rather arrogant, but I'm going to defend myself on this one.

Done this.
View attachment 881093

Spent ages orientating tramlines to minimise wasted time and to get efficiently around poles. Wrote a spreadsheet to calculate AB lines coordinates to thread through poles.
View attachment 881094
View attachment 881097

And spent literally months perfecting our bowser to absolutely minimise downtime.
View attachment 881095

And I think we have one of the better spray stores to making chem mixing as pain free and as quick as possible.
View attachment 881096

But maybe it is just my maths ability that's really slowing me down. But then again I didn't think you you had a physics degree from Oxford too so just maybe you can shove your abacus up your induction hopper.

Am I annoyed? Yes.
You clearly know what you are doing , you have an impressive set up and know how to use it , wouldn't waste any time getting upset with those on here who can only dream about being as good.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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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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