DD Drill and SLUGS

Agree generally. I wasn’t aiming comment at you by the way but I’ve seen it so many times, attempts at no till which just don’t work so they throw the whole thing out the window when a ten minute conversation with someone local doing it could have made a huge difference

If I can make it work down here on the wet stuff we call soil, late and behind maize then you guys elsewhere should have no problems.
 

snarling bee

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Bedfordshire
Firstly, I would have rolled if it had been dry enough.(and it is a 12m set pulled by a 1,000HP tractor)
Secondly, I'm not throwing in the towel due to one demo with a drill
Thirdly, I am trying to learn
Fourthly, There are several in this area who have at least partially thrown in the towel after many years of trying, with one exception.
Fifthly, I understand that I have not used slug pellets or had any damage for 5 years (with one exception) and one demo has caused me to use pellets in a situation where I would not have expected to. Nobody on here is any help other than I am not trying hard enough and am obviously stuck in the 1970's. So thats useful.
Sixthly. Last time I tried DDing I also had to use copious amounts of slug pellets to keep the crop, but that was after OSR.
Seventhly. The section of the field drilled with a tine drill with no rollers at all has had no slug damage, yet the Avatar drilled section 2m away has. No I don't understand it either.
Eighthly. Its not about coulter pressure.
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
Firstly, I would have rolled if it had been dry enough.(and it is a 12m set pulled by a 1,000HP tractor)
Secondly, I'm not throwing in the towel due to one demo with a drill
Thirdly, I am trying to learn
Fourthly, There are several in this area who have at least partially thrown in the towel after many years of trying, with one exception.
Fifthly, I understand that I have not used slug pellets or had any damage for 5 years (with one exception) and one demo has caused me to use pellets in a situation where I would not have expected to. Nobody on here is any help other than I am not trying hard enough and am obviously stuck in the 1970's. So thats useful.
Sixthly. Last time I tried DDing I also had to use copious amounts of slug pellets to keep the crop, but that was after OSR.
Seventhly. The section of the field drilled with a tine drill with no rollers at all has had no slug damage, yet the Avatar drilled section 2m away has. No I don't understand it either.
Eighthly. Its not about coulter pressure.
Tine drills are better than disc drills especially in the early years of direct drilling.
We didn’t have slugs until we started growing osr again because it’s worth loads.
coulter pressure makes no difference.
We have much worse slug pressure after our avatar than our sprinter (direct), but much less BG issues after the avatar than the sprinter.
I look forward to hearing how you get on as i respect your posts and knowledge on here more than most.
 

Badshot

Member
Location
Kent
My view is,
I'd sooner control slugs with pellets, than spend a fortune on tractors, cultivators, manhours, diesel, etc, etc.

My main slug problems now are after winter beans.

Also, down here at least, it's been a tough autumn for slugs following such a wet summer.

Last year I used a lot less pellets.

And finally, yes a tine drill is better at the start of DD. But now I have really broken the back of the BG with the gd, and feel I can at last start to reap the rewards with lower spend on controlling it.
I saw a large reduction on blw herbicides last year, so fingers crossed I can keep it going.
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
My view is,
I'd sooner control slugs with pellets, than spend a fortune on tractors, cultivators, manhours, diesel, etc, etc.

My main slug problems now are after winter beans.

Also, down here at least, it's been a tough autumn for slugs following such a wet summer.

Last year I used a lot less pellets.

And finally, yes a tine drill is better at the start of DD. But now I have really broken the back of the BG with the gd, and feel I can at last start to reap the rewards with lower spend on controlling it.
I saw a large reduction on blw herbicides last year, so fingers crossed I can keep it going.
I have about 700ha with each a tine and a disc drill. There’s some situations where I would swap them. I keep learning. Nothing awful but it’s coming down to nuance now. Nearly field by field.
 

alomy75

Member
Tine drills are better than disc drills especially in the early years of direct drilling.
We didn’t have slugs until we started growing osr again because it’s worth loads.
coulter pressure makes no difference.
We have much worse slug pressure after our avatar than our sprinter (direct), but much less BG issues after the avatar than the sprinter.
I look forward to hearing how you get on as i respect your posts and knowledge on here more than most.
What coulters have you got on the Sprinter?
 

britt

Member
BASE UK Member
We use less slug pellets here than before we went notill, but to think you can drop them completely is a bit optimistic in my view.
I think rape gets more blame than it deserves, except in the wheat following it when the best strategy is to leave the volunteers in place for the slugs to eat, then pellet as the pre-em spray kills it.
I've had to pellet the rape planted this year 2 or 3 times (1/3rd rate each time). After a 5 year gap you can't blame rape for their presence.
Wet summers are the biggest cause of high slug numbers.
Pellets are a tool that is available, I don't see a problem in using them if needed. As said, it's less than before. Count your blessings, plan for your problems.
Higher seed rates solve a lot of problems, and if your using non dressed home saved seed it's often a cheep solution to a number of problems in one go (slugs, weed competition, poor tillering due to no N release, etc.).
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
We use less slug pellets here than before we went notill, but to think you can drop them completely is a bit optimistic in my view.
I think rape gets more blame than it deserves, except in the wheat following it when the best strategy is to leave the volunteers in place for the slugs to eat, then pellet as the pre-em spray kills it.
I've had to pellet the rape planted this year 2 or 3 times (1/3rd rate each time). After a 5 year gap you can't blame rape for their presence.
Wet summers are the biggest cause of high slug numbers.
Pellets are a tool that is available, I don't see a problem in using them if needed. As said, it's less than before. Count your blessings, plan for your problems.
Higher seed rates solve a lot of problems, and if your using non dressed home saved seed it's often a cheep solution to a number of problems in one go (slugs, weed competition, poor tillering due to no N release, etc.).
Seen plenty of slug damage in cultivated fields around here this year aswell.
 

BuskhillFarm

Member
Arable Farmer
Do you have slug problems just with osr or all cereals. I’m still plough and sowed 4 goes of pellets just on the outside and they still took out a 3-4 metre strip in places (mostly the poorer places, and a roadside)
 

britt

Member
BASE UK Member
We only generally get a slug problem establishing rape or wheat after rape. Given the benefit of that deep tap root, a good wheat after and the margin if you get a good crop, a few pellets is a small price to pay.
The other one is game cover crops which are all spring notill planted. Leatherjackets or Bionamid fly are also a problem in these.
 

britt

Member
BASE UK Member
I dont get this idea of letting slugs eat covers instead of a crop, to me all that does is encourage the buggers to breed even more so create more problems down the linr
Doesn't seem to. I pellet at the point where they move from the volunteer rape to the wheat.
You save the seed from being hollowed (which is terminal) and the crop can survive a bit of grazing.
 

clbarclay

Member
Location
Worcestershire
There has been quite a strong correlation here between poor covers of rape volunteers leading to poor following WW crops and good covers of rape volunteers being followed by good establishment or WW crops.

I feel having the rape cover there does help, but it's as much to do with things like weather from harvest onwards helping both the volunteers and the WW establish.

I remember when we told the agronomist what we were going to do the first time we tried drilling WW on the green into rape volunteers. I'm pretty sure he was thinking about getting us sectioned under the mental health act. The rape volunteers were axle high at drilling, but just about everything seemed to go right for that field that year, including the weather and a genuinely accidental overdose of N. It went on to one another of our best ever yeilds.
 

Clive

Staff Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lichfield
I dont get this idea of letting slugs eat covers instead of a crop, to me all that does is encourage the buggers to breed even more so create more problems down the linr

if your timing is good and weather average the slug pressure disappears as the cover does as you head into frosty weather

doesn’t always work but I’ve seen it time perfectly in previous season and established wheat into vol osr that was absolutely full of slugs without need for a single dose of pellets
 

britt

Member
BASE UK Member
There has been quite a strong correlation here between poor covers of rape volunteers leading to poor following WW crops and good covers of rape volunteers being followed by good establishment or WW crops.

I feel having the rape cover there does help, but it's as much to do with things like weather from harvest onwards helping both the volunteers and the WW establish.

I remember when we told the agronomist what we were going to do the first time we tried drilling WW on the green into rape volunteers. I'm pretty sure he was thinking about getting us sectioned under the mental health act. The rape volunteers were axle high at drilling, but just about everything seemed to go right for that field that year, including the weather and a genuinely accidental overdose of N. It went on to one another of our best ever yeilds.
On a particular field a few years ago I sprayed out a patch of rape volunteers as I wanted to ensure that they didn't shade the black grass from the glyphosate and to the line the wheat did much better in the unsprayed part and seed hollowing was only a problem in the sprayed area.
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
On a particular field a few years ago I sprayed out a patch of rape volunteers as I wanted to ensure that they didn't shade the black grass from the glyphosate and to the line the wheat did much better in the unsprayed part and seed hollowing was only a problem in the sprayed area.
A near neighbour lost a field of wheat to slugs last year (shallow cult I think) and it was the only one that was bare of volunteers. The ones next to it with volunteers were okay.
 

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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