farming knowledge gone.

[Cowcorn]

That must be five acres seedless out of thirty
Muppet

That was my reckoning too .
Looks like trials plots with walkways .

 

[glasshouse]

That was my reckoning too .
Looks like trials plots with walkways .

Pic?

 

[Cowcorn]

Pic?

Not a smart phone owner but son has a pic on his will get him to put it up tomorrow

 

[Red Fred]

Can he patch it?

Old single row behind a British Anzani. He wouldn't do that again in a hurry!

 

[ajd132]

This is such a ludicrous conversation. You don’t get blocked coulters because of gps.

 

[FG.]

I borrowed a huge new John Deere (8000 something?)to pull my loader tractor out of a hole and 10 minutes after being given the keys and a perfunctory talk in what to do, I was still sitting in the dealer's yard trying to figure out how to make it go. Luckily one of the young lads walked by and rescued me
I tend to know how to do a variety of jobs but not to perfection. I have a mate helping me at the moment since I was briefly out of action and he is a gardener/handyman/ He will spend all day doing a job to perfection and will do a precision job far better than I could, but I don't think he would cope with farm work as it so often it relies on bodges and changes of plan. On a small farm, I think you have to be a Jack of all trades or else you wouldn't get everything done. However in my mates line of work, his mostly elderly customers want a neat job doing and don't mind if he spends all day at it.

Had a similar sort of situation with a new JD I hired 10 years.
Got it home and got on fine, it's when it got dark was the problem...my older JD's had switches to turn the cab lights on.
Rang my nephew and all was illuminated.
As he grew up, he spent alot of time here and i loved showing him and letting have a go and learn.
Our more mutual interest in mechanical stuff was great and still is, but he went off into the building trade.
I don't have kids and I do feel rather sad sometimes that when I fall off my perch, all my knowledge will be gone.
My dad, on the other hand, who died a long time ago, really struggled to pass on knowledge to me and I just had to find my own way.
My much older brother seemed to get that knowledge, but then left farming which seemed to changed dads outlook.

 

[Lowland1]

We often used to get phone calls from my Dad as to how do i make this tractor move or lift or where does the key fit when he was shipping machinery to us in Kenya. The last tractor job he did was rolling some barley in with a new Claas tractor my son set him off and as he was getting out the cab he asked how does he stop it. He wasn’t pleased with answer of ‘You’ve got to get behind it and shout woah at it.’

 

[Billboy1]

everyone finishes on the rolls don't they ?

 

[glasshouse]

Old single row behind a British Anzani. He wouldn't do that again in a hurry!

I can lend you a push seeder, he should be made to do it.

 

[glasshouse]

This is such a ludicrous conversation. You don’t get blocked coulters because of gps.

The youngsters think technology does everything and are obsessed with straight lines.
I sent a lad to sow osr, and when we cleaned seeder, over half the pipes were blocked. Luckily it was same e day so had to send him over it again.

 

[Shutesy]

Going off topic @Shutesy youre now working with the top notch gear a million miles from the bad old days of tying up the pipes on the 30 with string !!!
How is your former man doing is he still going ??

Impressed anyone remembers that, it was years ago I last mentioned him
He's still going. Buys a new 80hp tractor every 3-4 years to swap for the one he bought 3 years before. Has about 10 tractors in total on the farm dating back a v long time. Never buys any new implements to go on the back. Same Massey 30 drill still dragged out of the shed every year, same 40+ year old discs, wagtail spreader, 12m manual fold mounted sprayer, all over roughly 400 acres arable and 200 grassland! Would think with the price of fert now he's probably dropped his rates from his standard 100kg N/ha on wheats to more like 50kg. Looks like he's given up on herbicides as well or he's loosing the battle on blackgrass as his crops are a weedy mess. Wonderful advert for modern British farming

 

[Top Tip.]

Impressed anyone remembers that, it was years ago I last mentioned him
He's still going. Buys a new 80hp tractor every 3-4 years to swap for the one he bought 3 years before. Has about 10 tractors in total on the farm dating back a v long time. Never buys any new implements to go on the back. Same Massey 30 drill still dragged out of the shed every year, same 40+ year old discs, wagtail spreader, 12m manual fold mounted sprayer, all over roughly 400 acres arable and 200 grassland! Would think with the price of fert now he's probably dropped his rates from his standard 100kg N/ha on wheats to more like 50kg. Looks like he's given up on herbicides as well or he's loosing the battle on blackgrass as his crops are a weedy mess. Wonderful advert for modern British farming

I’ll bet it’s profitable though!!

 

[Shutesy]

I’ll bet it’s profitable though!!

Bet it isn't as profitable as you think. Thin crops full of weeds and disease producing 1.5t/acre max. If it was that good a system everyone would be doing it!

 

[tullah]

Bet it isn't as profitable as you think. Thin crops full of weeds and disease producing 1.5t/acre max. If it was that good a system everyone would be doing it!

No they wouldn't all be doing it.
They have to buy shiny new kit with electrics because nobody will drive the old stuff despite it having nil depreciation and few repairs.

 

[glasshouse]

Impressed anyone remembers that, it was years ago I last mentioned him
He's still going. Buys a new 80hp tractor every 3-4 years to swap for the one he bought 3 years before. Has about 10 tractors in total on the farm dating back a v long time. Never buys any new implements to go on the back. Same Massey 30 drill still dragged out of the shed every year, same 40+ year old discs, wagtail spreader, 12m manual fold mounted sprayer, all over roughly 400 acres arable and 200 grassland! Would think with the price of fert now he's probably dropped his rates from his standard 100kg N/ha on wheats to more like 50kg. Looks like he's given up on herbicides as well or he's loosing the battle on blackgrass as his crops are a weedy mess. Wonderful advert for modern British farming

Probably has millions in the bank

 

[Red Fred]

There seems to me to be a middle ground where you are big enough to need decent kit but not big enough to gain the full benefits of its use. I used to despair of my dad who planted our 50 acres of barley, oats and triticale for cow feed with the wagtail. At college, we were told about modern drills and seed spacing, etc, but dad used to just ignore it and broadcast his seed in the time it would have taken me to get out a drill and grease it. The funny thing was, he repeatedly won prizes at the local Growmore club for best arable crops, and he didn't even have tramlines.

 

[Cowcorn]

I’ll bet it’s profitable though!!

Well the new tractor might only be 80 hp but he must have the price of it !!
So things are reasonably sound ....
And of course with all old kit he wont be looking over his hedge at his neighbours field thinking about contract farming to make the payments
Then 10 old low houred classics tend to come into a fair lump of money at a dispersal auction so hes hardly losing anything by holding on ....
Maybe this is the future whatever you can make its for yourself no the land agents ,fert companies , and mach manafacturers ......

 

[Sharpy]

There seems to me to be a middle ground where you are big enough to need decent kit but not big enough to gain the full benefits of its use. I used to despair of my dad who planted our 50 acres of barley, oats and triticale for cow feed with the wagtail. At college, we were told about modern drills and seed spacing, etc, but dad used to just ignore it and broadcast his seed in the time it would have taken me to get out a drill and grease it. The funny thing was, he repeatedly won prizes at the local Growmore club for best arable crops, and he didn't even have tramlines.

Thing is that the broadcast seed mimics nature, each seed has a wee bit more room as opposed to seed in a row sown by a drill.

 

[Red Fred]

I find I accept things because "everyone knows that", but in fact it isn't always that simple. Vegans do the same when presented with some well crafted theory about saving the planet, but won't accept that there is more than one way to skin a cat (not if you are a vegan, obviously )
IAs well a the "obvious benefits" of seed drills, I was watching a Perpetual Motion episode on youtube about the Grey Fergie. It is now accepted as gospel that the grey Fergie was about the most important invention in modern food production with its revolutionary draft control and three point hitch and I completely follow this, but when I look at what I actually do on a daily basis, 90% of it has no connection to Harry Ferguson. Out of my 5 tractors of varying vintage, only one has its arms connected as I find they get in the way of all the trailed implements I use nowadays. Everyone of them has a sophisticated and expensive draft control system, yet only one has ever used it in anger from new, and that includes my 1970 IH434 which has never even worn the paint off it all. Most of what I do, I could do with my old Allis Chalmers if only it had a larger diesel engine and electric starter. The problem is, no one would have bought a tractor without the hydraulics even in 1970 as it would have had no resale value so we are stuck in a loop of what we think we might need.

 

[Lowland1]

There seems to me to be a middle ground where you are big enough to need decent kit but not big enough to gain the full benefits of its use. I used to despair of my dad who planted our 50 acres of barley, oats and triticale for cow feed with the wagtail. At college, we were told about modern drills and seed spacing, etc, but dad used to just ignore it and broadcast his seed in the time it would have taken me to get out a drill and grease it. The funny thing was, he repeatedly won prizes at the local Growmore club for best arable crops, and he didn't even have tramlines.

At home there was a 400 acre farm at the end of our fen farmed by a big farming company who weren’t good at farming fen land and farmed it as an afterthought so would often come and work it when their heavy land was too wet. All their wheat was spun on and worked in with heavy spring tines as the land was light silt it would be covered to different depths and would emerge poorly so we’d all smile and reckon they knew nothing even though the method worked on heavier land. I’ve been toying with replacing my homemade drill with a Claydon or similar but recently I was having problems drilling some poorly cleaned homesaved seed due to blockages and finally resorted to spinning it on and cultipressing it in. The results are far better than drilling and now I’m thinking Jethro Tull was very overrated.