Best mower for 300ac of stewardship grass

[SilliamWhale]

If you start removing the organic matter your going to be missing out on opportunity to improve the soil. Balers, chasers etc won’t help your structure

I wouldn't worry about that. The soil will be ok plus some income.

Mind the whole scheme seems madness to me!What are the target species they are trying to support here?

 

[DanM]

For wild flowers to thrive to meet the terms of the AB8 prescription you need to manage the canopy & cutting it short is the best way of doing so. A thick layer of mulch won't help the flowers even if it helps the soil health. Wild flowers like low fertility! Horses for courses.

if your managing for wildflowers, then well managed grazing is the best way; by someone with experience of removing animals and adjusting stocking rates to achieve the desired outcomes. It’s significantly cheaper as well.

 

[Brisel]

if your managing for wildflowers, then well managed grazing is the best way; by someone with experience of removing animals and adjusting stocking rates to achieve the desired outcomes. It’s significantly cheaper as well.

Noty so cheap if there's no infrastructure for grazing such as water and fencing but otherwise you're absolutely right I don't remember seeing grazing banned on the CS prescription, just date restrictions for the flowering etc.

 

[Razorback]

That looks a good bit of kit.

The Razorback Rotary wing mower comes in two models - RT500 & RT750. If you would like any more information please ring us.

RT Mower | Razorback Limited

razorbackuk.com

 

[Razorback]

Speaking of Spearhead, this is Mr Lole's new machine. Probably a keen price to get them out there, and you know it'll be well made.

Thanks @E_B for sharing our video of Mr Lole's New machine.

RT Mower | Razorback Limited

razorbackuk.com

 

[AFM]

If anyone would like a price on any Spearhead machines then please get in touch. We do a minimum of 10% off parts. Machines very well priced and also in stock.

1. Spearhead – Attlefield Farm Machinery

www.afmachinery.co.uk

 

[Feldspar]

Can I ask the difference for the job in the original post between a 6 blade and 3 blade Spearhead Multicut 620. How much difference will the 6 blades make? And can you add the extra blades if you spec a 3 bladed one to start with. TIA.

 

[Feldspar]

Well, made the plunge on the mower (new Spearhead Multicut 620) at least. Wait to see if my stewardship application is accepted as there were a few complications.

 

[Brisel]

Can I ask the difference for the job in the original post between a 6 blade and 3 blade Spearhead Multicut 620. How much difference will the 6 blades make? And can you add the extra blades if you spec a 3 bladed one to start with. TIA.

You’d have to talk to Spearhead about whether the driveline will take the extra power required to start up but the hp of the tractor and how aggressively the pto engages is another variable. I’ll see if I can dig out some material on the mulitcut/starcut toppers later. They certainly do a good job and don’t leave swaths.

 

[Feldspar]

You’d have to talk to Spearhead about whether the driveline will take the extra power required to start up but the hp of the tractor and how aggressively the pto engages is another variable. I’ll see if I can dig out some material on the mulitcut/starcut toppers later. They certainly do a good job and don’t leave swaths.

We have the extra mulching blades fitted. It is a bit of a struggle to start it up with our little tractor. In thick grass 130hp nowhere near enough. Going to put the 200hp tractor on in future.

Too much grass!

 

[Overby]

I am just sitting down to do the numbers between GS4 and AB8. I have to say on the surface of things it does seem that the payment rates are a bit out of kilter.

AB8 gives 5 x 539 = £2,695 / ha over the 5yr agreement. Compared to GS4, the establishment costs will be the same roughly (although that assumes seed costs are the same - need to check this) – I'll assume £250/ha for both options. The difference to me between the two will be having to top the AB8 probably about 9 times during the 5 year period on a conservative estimate. NAAC mowing rates are £30/ha, but with sharing a mower and using existing labour and machinery (and this depends on how much spare capacity we have on these) I reckon our true costs would be sub £20/ha. Let's use £30/ha to be conservative.

This means the additional cost of AB8 is 9 x £30/ha. But it pays an additional £230/ha each year. Putting this together I get:

(230x5) - (9x30) = £880/ha difference between the two options.

And this is where the numbers feel unfair. For GS4 you would seed the ground in August of year 1. I don't know how long until that land would be useful to grazing livestock? 6 months? 12 months? Assume it's 12 months from the start of an agreement (would be Jan 2021 for me). The option ceases on Dec of the 5th year, so that leaves 4 years within the life of the scheme when you would expect a grazing income. But that grazing income has to beat 880 / 4 = £220 / ha / yr, and with GS4 you can't graze for a 5 week period in early summer to allow the mix to flower. A few people have PMed about grazing, and they will read this and can obviously let me know, but my assumption is that they are not going to be able to afford these sorts of rents.

Other considerations which might shift the above numbers. If someone wants to graze AB8 in the summer it could save a mowing pass, but as @Brisel has said, this is introducing complexity and risk of non-compliance. Alternatively, if GS4 with livestock will impact soil fertility in a more positive way than AB8, that is obviously a good thing, but how do I value this?

When we sat down as a family a while back to discuss our strategy in the current volatile and uncertain times, our overriding decision was to simplify and diversify our business. This has meant cutting down our arable production in favour of a sizeable stewardship scheme with a lot of fallow in it. The majority view was that with big uncertainty over our trading relationships with other countries means there are increased risks in crop production and perhaps even more so in some types of livestock farming (certainly this is what the AHDB impact assessments show). We, therefore, decided to batten down the hatches and try and be as resilient as we could until things sort themselves out and we can perhaps return to growing more crops again.

Taking the above paragraph in line with the above calculations, it does bring me back to @digger64's point, that is they have set these payment rates to give greater rewards to the less risky option and lower rewards to the (admittedly more complicated) option that allows an opportunity for more 'normal' farming. To get to @Hindsight's point, is this actually what they want? In an ideal world I'd like to opportunity to someone to make use of the ground, but given the current climate, unless there's a sizeable numerical advantage, I know that our collective decision will be to take the simpler and less risky option. Bit of a topsy turvy world at the moment it feels. I think they are going to have to think very carefully about how they set these ELMS up.

Any thoughts on the above anyone?

How did you get on with this? I'm thinking along similar lines for next year. Did you go for AB8 and how did you manage it?

 

[Feldspar]

How did you get on with this? I'm thinking along similar lines for next year. Did you go for AB8 and how did you manage it?

Funnily enough I have a contract to sign for an agreement to start 6 months ago. RPA have been very slow, although there was an issue with a hangover from a previous scheme from the last landowner. They should have sorted it months ago nonetheless.

Anyway, we will accept it and I went for pretty much all AB8 in the end. Looked at the livestock GS4 option and decided against for some of the reasons I put before. Have bought a 6m Spearhead mower and will top to establish. Undecided whether to try and bale the cuttings or not once established. Had a chat about this today and issue could be the cutting height not being suitable for hay mowers (10cm minimum). We already have 30ha of AB8 in our other scheme and that has been largely OK. Thistles and overly fertile ground being the slight challenges. You have to tolerate a level of thistles. I've not found a way of reducing their numbers completely.

 

[Feldspar]

I wouldn't worry about that. The soil will be ok plus some income.

Mind the whole scheme seems madness to me!What are the target species they are trying to support here?

This is some of our AB8. Alive with pollinators yesterday. Last time I was in there I got collared by a local resident who I thought was going to complain about something. Told me how her row of houses all loved the field and how uplifting it was. Was spraying my best field of wheat the other day. No till and all. No one came to congratulate me about that.

 

[Overby]

This is some of our AB8. Alive with pollinators yesterday. Last time I was in there I got collared by a local resident who I thought was going to complain about something. Told me how her row of houses all loved the field and how uplifting it was. Was spraying my best field of wheat the other day. No till and all. No one came to congratulate me about that.
View attachment 969783

That looks . There'll be a decent crop of bales if you can cut it too, should work at 10cm?

 

[Anymulewilldo]

This is some of our AB8. Alive with pollinators yesterday. Last time I was in there I got collared by a local resident who I thought was going to complain about something. Told me how her row of houses all loved the field and how uplifting it was. Was spraying my best field of wheat the other day. No till and all. No one came to congratulate me about that.
View attachment 969783

I hope you thanked her, it is her tax money paying for it after all…

 

[CopperBeech]

I think it’s fundamentally wrong we are putting so much ground into non productive stuff like this and getting paid for it. Tin hat on!

 

[CopperBeech]

Lots of rich city types buying farms, removing the livestock etc and sticking it into a mix they can just top and be paid lots for. While we import our meat from over seas. Well done guys, great job. Saving the world ......

 

[Feldspar]

I think it’s fundamentally wrong we are putting so much ground into non productive stuff like this and getting paid for it. Tin hat on!

I understand this argument. My response is that if the public want me to produce food, stop voting for governments that give every signal to food producers in this country that they'd rather they do something else and let the Australians / Brazilians do it. I'm just following pricing signals.

 

[Feldspar]

@Feldspar Major Cyclone?

Not seen one used but plenty vids on YouTube and it appears a very capable machine

Already bought a Spearhead for the topping job to help establishment. I'm just deliberating about whether to get the grass baled up. This grass will be down for 5 years, but then the aims is to return a lot of it to arable, so I don't want to strip too much fertility away. Don't want it too high to let the flowers establish properly, but aside from that I want the grass to improve the soil not denude it.

 

[Dukes Fit]

Already bought a Spearhead for the topping job to help establishment. I'm just deliberating about whether to get the grass baled up. This grass will be down for 5 years, but then the aims is to return a lot of it to arable, so I don't want to strip too much fertility away. Don't want it too high to let the flowers establish properly, but aside from that I want the grass to improve the soil not denude it.

Yeah, saw that before I got to the end of the 3rd page