Farmer Roy's Random Thoughts - I never said it was easy.

[Farmer Roy]

Cant like than Roy - shows just how serious it is out there.

Was the old mast framework reinforced as it looks like it stood up well and took your weight OK

Floodway sign just outside my entrance, that's mine either side of road
death was over the fence, a neighbours

old windmill tower, minus the wheel on top, that I now use for my Auto Steer base station - so yes, plenty strong enough, been subjected to much stronger forces than my puny frame

 

[Ukjay]

Floodway sign just outside my entrance, that's mine either side of road
death was over the fence, a neighbours

old windmill tower, minus the wheel on top, that I now use for my Auto Steer base station - so yes, plenty strong enough, been subjected to much stronger forces than my puny frame

Was the animal one of the Solicitors beasts that you showed in one of your earlier threads, or was that a different place?

 

[Farmer Roy]

Was the animal one of the Solicitors beasts that you showed in one of your earlier threads, or was that a different place?

No, solicitors place was about 40km away where I was doing some contracting.
This is a neighbour who is having a much harder time of it . . .

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Some heavy ones in there

Was there much variation when they came our are those ones just really good doers?

A bit of both. There was quite a range when they came but they were only weighed as a truck-load until I put them over the scales in September. By then there was a similar range - plus I took the bottom end off when the dry hit us.
They have still put it on OK on the silage inside, it is not really a system designed to fatten - more to "well maintain" them.

The heaviest 8 we kept back average about 600... time for a reality check for the others though, quite wintry down here.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

View attachment 685856 View attachment 685858 View attachment 685860 View attachment 685862

I do like 'the drone photo' - second one down - what's the darker brown area?
Cultivation or a crop result?

 

[Farmer Roy]

I do like 'the drone photo' - second one down - what's the darker brown area?
Cultivation or a crop result?

Dryland cotton after the bush has been mulched & root cut. Lots of little twigs & sticks mulched into short pieces, the crop residue is much darker than the pale oxidised wheat stubble next to it

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Dryland cotton after the bush has been mulched & root cut. Lots of little twigs & sticks mulched into short pieces, the crop residue is much darker than the pale oxidised wheat stubble next to it

Cheers mate

The landscape just looks so.... oxidised...and bright!!

I will be one of the few silly enough to live close enough to the pole to actually have a gloomy, semi-lit, winter.
She's dark by 5 and not light til 8, down here... and I love it for being so, but the snow can go.

 

[Farmer Roy]

Cheers mate

The landscape just looks so.... oxidised...and bright!!

I will be one of the few silly enough to live close enough to the pole to actually have a gloomy, semi-lit, winter.
She's dark by 5 and not light til 8, down here... and I love it for being so, but the snow can go.

yeah, I still have trouble getting my head around how far south you actually are, although I have experienced similar in northern Scotland which I assume is about as far north ?

good stuff though, always been drawn to & fascinated by extreme environments, be it deserts or near polar conditions. Middle of the road is for soft cocks hey, being on the edge is much more interesting

 

[Kiwi Pete]

yeah, I still have trouble getting my head around how far south you actually are, although I have experienced similar in northern Scotland which I assume is about as far north ?

good stuff though, always been drawn to & fascinated by extreme environments, be it deserts or near polar conditions. Middle of the road is for soft cocks hey, being on the edge is much more interesting

We are only about 15 degrees south of you.
By contrast even Cornwall is further North than we are south - but we don't have warming currents to offset our climate - when we do, we are in trouble!

(As you saw this summer, we rely on cool damp currents as much as our European cousins rely on the warm damp ones; this summer it reversed and our airflow came from your direction for several months - please, don't ever do that again )

So, that "levels up the playing field" again, we have the sun-hour advantage of the latitude and the rain/humidity advantage of being halfway to the pole
Just, no predictability whatsoever - we seldom even get days of one thing at a time, very dynamic and extreme is the average here.
Silage sheets disappear on a regular basis, baleage stacks get blown over, I have seen video of topdressing planes flying backwards and even landing backwards, which is quite a feat the first thing we know about the weather, is what hits us. Satellite imagery even is pretty pointless due to not enough affected populace - hence the overseas apps are more accurate than our met office forecasts (I have about 8 different weather feeds)
By contrast, you may as well live in Africa as be a close neighbour

 

[Farmer Roy]

View attachment 685890
We are only about 15 degrees south of you.
By contrast even Cornwall is further North than we are south - but we don't have warming currents to offset our climate - when we do, we are in trouble!

(As you saw this summer, we rely on cool damp currents as much as our European cousins rely on the warm damp ones; this summer it reversed and our airflow came from your direction for several months - please, don't ever do that again )

So, that "levels up the playing field" again, we have the sun-hour advantage of the latitude and the rain/humidity advantage of being halfway to the pole
Just, no predictability whatsoever - we seldom even get days of one thing at a time, very dynamic and extreme is the average here.
Silage sheets disappear on a regular basis, baleage stacks get blown over, I have seen video of topdressing planes flying backwards and even landing backwards, which is quite a feat the first thing we know about the weather, is what hits us. Satellite imagery even is pretty pointless due to not enough affected populace - hence the overseas apps are more accurate than our met office forecasts (I have about 8 different weather feeds)
By contrast, you may as well live in Africa as be a close neighbour

Yes, I had a look after I wrote that
UK is MUCH further north . . .
As you say, it is the warm ocean currents that keep a large part of the UK a green & pleasant land, not a frozen arctic wasteland
Ocean currents are changing as a result of human intervention & climate change
The beast from the east was only an indication of what is to come . . .

 

[Yale]

Just seen this on the news.

Australians taking the World Cup a little too serious....well at least the wildlife.

 

[hendrebc]

only ever been in a strip club once
got dragged into one by a fertiliser company rep after a test rugby game in Sydney ( they paid for tickets & accommodation ). It was about the saddest place I'd been. I didn't know who was saddest, the girls or the blokes watching them . . .
got bored pretty quickly & drinks were too expensive so we managed to escape & found a pub instead

This was only the second id ever been in. The last one was when i was about 19 and it was 3am and nowere else would let us in so i say in the corner on my own while my friends spent a fortune
Like you say a very sad place

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Yes, I had a look after I wrote that
UK is MUCH further north . . .
As you say, it is the warm ocean currents that keep a large part of the UK a green & pleasant land, not a frozen arctic wasteland
Ocean currents are changing as a result of human intervention & climate change
The beast from the east was only an indication of what is to come . . .

I agree.
We can't rely totally on patterns to save us, even though the pattern is to save us.

Patterns are good basis for a yearly plan, but you have to leave room to breathe for variations. I guess I got bit by exactly this, I count on 6 weeks of no rain, 16 weeks is bothersome.
16 months is a different story, again....
Most of our growing season disappeared but we still got by - my neighbour is facing the big questions from the bank unfortunately.
He is under the "it's just like Canterbury, with free irrigation" mindset - hope didn't grow him grass, either, and now needs to pull 100k out of the kitty to buy feed.... add in 2.5 labour units and a lot of debt to service, it isn't a rosy picture.

Yet again, scale is no guarantee of anything.

 

[holwellcourtfarm]

Yes, I had a look after I wrote that
UK is MUCH further north . . .
As you say, it is the warm ocean currents that keep a large part of the UK a green & pleasant land, not a frozen arctic wasteland
Ocean currents are changing as a result of human intervention & climate change
The beast from the east was only an indication of what is to come . . .

Yep.

Several folk whose job it is to understand climate change say it's possible that ice cap melting may "switch off" the mechanism that drives the Gulf Steam.

Perhaps then UK folk will stop belly-aching about a bit of snow as they'll get so much they'll be properly prepared for it




See, I'm already thinking of myself as an expat

 

[holwellcourtfarm]

I agree.
We can't rely totally on patterns to save us, even though the pattern is to save us.

Patterns are good basis for a yearly plan, but you have to leave room to breathe for variations. I guess I got bit by exactly this, I count on 6 weeks of no rain, 16 weeks is bothersome.
16 months is a different story, again....
Most of our growing season disappeared but we still got by - my neighbour is facing the big questions from the bank unfortunately.
He is under the "it's just like Canterbury, with free irrigation" mindset - hope didn't grow him grass, either, and now needs to pull 100k out of the kitty to buy feed.... add in 2.5 labour units and a lot of debt to service, it isn't a rosy picture.

Yet again, scale is no guarantee of anything.

Scale just makes EVERYTHING bigger: rewards, problems, workload, crises.

 

[Bill dog]

Yep.

Several folk whose job it is to understand climate change say it's possible that ice cap melting may "switch off" the mechanism that drives the Gulf Steam.

Perhaps then UK folk will stop belly-aching about a bit of snow as they'll get so much they'll be properly prepared for it




See, I'm already thinking of myself as an expat

Should that become reality, please may I assist you relocate by carrying your bags for you ! You can drop me at the shepherds church in Tekapo. The view from there will do me just fine !

 

[glasshouse]

At least i was still walking havent had that much to drink in a llloooonngg time. Not my thing but when they failed to kill me with pints they tried harder with whiskey and came damn close

so your lot werent dressed as pirates?

 

[Kiwi Pete]

See, I'm already thinking of myself as an expat

Thinking back to a conversation I had with a weary looking traveller this time last year (exactly) the force seems to be strong, in some

NZ will suit you from the ground, up.

 

[hendrebc]

so your lot werent dressed as pirates?

No luckily they forgot my costume at home
Saw quite a few in stag do shirts though but not us. We were just dressed normally. Definetlet not in check shirts and schoffel bodywarmers like the young farmer dress code thread though

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Scale just makes EVERYTHING bigger: rewards, problems, workload, crises.

You forgot the big one: lack of adaptability
and large scale investment; which brings sentiment to "business"
If oats suddenly looked more profitable and less risk than livestock, I would be an oats farmer in 3 months!