any DD spring barley about?

[SilliamWhale]

Much of mine is looking pretty lacklustre and I can't quite put my finger on why.

Soil conditions are pretty good everywhere ie not compacted.

Just looking pale, not a lot of interest in tillering and pretty prostrate. What kind of plant population per m2 is ideal for SB. Its only lately got nicely warm though. Plant count per m2 is low

I know its a fussy bugger. I have found the odd leatherjacket larvae but not a huge amount - one every so often. Would that be contributing - is the threshold "one is enough"?

 

[rob1]

Most round here looks quite good regardless of establishment method. Perhaps the weather has had an effect in your area

 

[Feldspar]

Pretty much all the conventionally established spring barley around here looks great. On our bits it has pretty much covered the ground now. Some bits are too thick.

We have some DDed spring barley which was planted with a Claydon. Establishment is a bit patchy which I think is where the coulters were riding out but what is there looks reasonably healthy.

 

[BSH]

My spring barley is not looking great. I had a couple of fields that were ploughed and worked down and then drilled before the cold which delayed emergence for 5 weeks! In the meantime some had capped off so not looking great. The DD stuff is a mixed bag. I was basically a day late and dollar short on getting it in and on the clay cap it has hardly grown . In the field with an over wintered stubble it is pretty good but in the fields that were 18 month leys I have decided to do arable silage as the plant population is too low.

 

[Richard III]

Much of mine is looking pretty lacklustre and I can't quite put my finger on why.

Soil conditions are pretty good everywhere ie not compacted.

Just looking pale, not a lot of interest in tillering and pretty prostrate. What kind of plant population per m2 is ideal for SB. Its only lately got nicely warm though. Plant count per m2 is low "?

 

[martian]

Ours is a mixed bag, all drilled with 750a into sprayed off Pedders mix of varying voluptuousness. Some getting away well, others look thin and hungry as Will says. Beginning to see the wisdom of putting a sweetener down the tubes with the seed to get it off to a good start, barley is a pretty lazy plant...Would hope that as we improve our soils this will become less of an issue. Meanwhile...

 

[Richard III]

It's much the same here as with you Will, just not really getting on with it. The plough stuff around is generally not much better to even worse. some of the neighbours heavy land plough stuff is yellow in patches due to water logging. The only good looking barley about is the the stuff ploughed and drilled at the beginning of April.

Spring oats are a little better and spring beans are OK.

The D.D. w.wheats are just starting to look really good now the flag leaf is coming out. Happens every year, neighbours wheat looks better all spring until flag leaf time, it's always frustrating for a while!

It is starting to look like it will take a miracle for the barley to pull it's self round though.

 

[Will Blackburn]

I drilled W. wheat at the beginning of March and it looks rubbish, all there but going no-where. Growing nicely under the trees is my only clue, now is that because it is sheltered. My best guess is that the cold soil means it cannot access enough P, through a process of elimination, as it has had everything else. Patching up done on light ground is fine now?

Fortunately, echoing Richard's comments, DD W. wheat planted next to the road at the front of the farm looks like the best I've seen around here .

 

[Andy Howard]

Our spring beans look well, spring rape looks well. Spring oats are patchy. On the medium soils all fine. On the heavy wet soils the oats went into cold soils and it did not warm up, not great. Wish we had waited to start drilling till mid April as our latest drilled oats on worst land look the best. Should have listened to Elmsted on his bare bottom to soil advice. Thought we were already late though starting first week of April. Lesson learnt. The stuff on the heavy soils has only just started to grow away. some looks crap from a distance but when you get in the field the plants are there in the main just small. Coldest spring for 50 years, hopefully will not see another like it!! As said above our first wheats are really looking well, quietly very confident!! All DD with 750a.

 

[Andy Howard]

Edit the above post, spring rape seems to have been hammered in patches by slugs. Before I went away on holiday it looked fine, now thin in places, not happy especially as I have 40 farmers coming to have a look on Thursday!!! Remind me why we bother with rape!!

 

[willy]

I have dd drilled 100ha spring wheat mulika and Beloir looks cracking except where I did not use 25 kg dap down the spout,
I have also dd drilled 120 ha spring barley 100 ha had dap Dow the spout 20 ha ha it broad cast. Where I broad cast it t.he crop is only half the size of the stuff that was placed down the spout. All drilled witha dale except where we broad cast with the Claydon.

All were drilled between 8 16th april