I am actually going to put more rape in. With the early harvest it is a good opportunity. I would be going through and drilling a catch crop anyway so will just mix up 5kgs of farmers saved rape with some buckwheat and clover. Very little to lose really.
Going forward with Oilseed Rape.
- Thread starter chipchap
- Start date
yellow belly
Member
- Location
- south west lincolnshire
Lady birds give good control for black bean aphid if you do not spray weaves and bruchid both of which inscecticide give no improvement in margin
unfortunately the only potential control on fleabeetle is gm rape
Unless we find a way to promote the parasitic wasp
unfortunately the only potential control on fleabeetle is gm rape
Unless we find a way to promote the parasitic wasp
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Never been happier to ditch the stress and aggravation involved in growing OSR. If others want to believe the optimistic bulls**t of the supply trade and blow more cash failing to grow it then I’m not stopping them.?
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Anyone going to take advantage of these "nothing if it fails" offers then?
You can make the risk next to nothing if you don’t listen to the trade.
- Location
- south norfolk
Not growing it here next year.got about half left of what was drilled and that should have been ripped up too.be nice to spend winter not worrying about pigeons or having gas guns and batteries vandalised or stolen
Nick...
Nick...
Just got 2 ready for dad to take out to keep crows off some barley reminded me what a pain they are after having no rape last winter
What you going to grow instead? Clearly not sugar beet ?
- Location
- south norfolk
What rape I’ve got left is full of seed beet.due to lack of storage fallow will happen or if Land is in demand in the spring for maize maybe grow some of that.
Nick...
- Location
- Lincolnshire
I disagree. If you get a migration of fleabeetle in to your area and it’s anything less than perfect growing conditions then they graze it down to nothing. No amount of good intentions or wishful thinking alters that fact. Some folk have been lucky, generally in coastal or higher areas with all sorts of different establishment techniques. Others in land have been unlucky again with all sorts of different establishment techniques and timings. The only brassica that survived here last year were my stubble turnips but even they had too many larvae in them.
Fact is while farmers say they are “happy”with this deplorable situation then politicians will continue to take essential and ingenious tools away from us for no good scientific reason .
I am not happy about the neonic seed coating ban on my rape and beet. In fact I am very angry about it.
- Location
- South Shropshire
I sympathise with your problems growing brassicas and beet without efficient insecticide. However I question whether many of the insecticides used on farms in the last few decades ever should have received approval, and strongly suspect that as an industry we may well have been better off in the long run if some of them had never been released onto the market. The clock cannot be turned back, and we must either find a way forward or alter the way we farm.
Farm saved seed drill it early, limited risk.
- Location
- Lincolnshire
I have had two goes at drilling kale this spring, both failed due to drought and flea beetle. You just get to the point where you have had enough.
My beet has had two doses of sprayed on environmentally damaging insecticide because the neonic coating was banned. That spray programme has killed more beneficials than the seed coating ever did but it still got enough aphids into it to bring in loads of virus. I am not cheerful about it. I can’t find anything cheerful to say about it. It’s a crock of shite of Michael Gove’s making.
Rant over.
My beet has had two doses of sprayed on environmentally damaging insecticide because the neonic coating was banned. That spray programme has killed more beneficials than the seed coating ever did but it still got enough aphids into it to bring in loads of virus. I am not cheerful about it. I can’t find anything cheerful to say about it. It’s a crock of shite of Michael Gove’s making.
Rant over.
Trigger Happy
Member
- Location
- East Midlands
But what about the crops you take all the way through winter and only find out they are full of lava and buggered in april, seed for nothing but spend on herbicides and fert mounts up. You will have spent 75 plus % of inputs by then.
You need early drilled big strong plants. You should know by kerb timing if they are too heavily infested. Up until then the only money spent should be some nitrogen, a dose of pellets and a volunteer spray
- Location
- Lincolnshire
The only way I can see of growing it is to get a plant the size of a triffid before winter and hoping it’s big enough to withstand a heavy larvae infestation through the spring.
Several problems with that:
It entails early drilling but drilling before 23 aug here can lead to a bad cabbage root fly larvae infestation and very poor rooting or death.
It assumes you can get your crops off early which isn’t so easy further north.
If as is usually the case, it’s very dry, then the crop just doesn’t grow fast enough to get to any size before autumn.
Just too many things to go wrong.
Several problems with that:
It entails early drilling but drilling before 23 aug here can lead to a bad cabbage root fly larvae infestation and very poor rooting or death.
It assumes you can get your crops off early which isn’t so easy further north.
If as is usually the case, it’s very dry, then the crop just doesn’t grow fast enough to get to any size before autumn.
Just too many things to go wrong.
- Location
- Lincolnshire
agree an opportunist punt with farm saved seed limits losses. The right weather makes or breaks it and you still have time to drill something else if it fails.
That’s fair enough. I’m taking the gamble to put more in because of early harvest. Doubt I could do it in a more normal year
- Location
- Bury St Edmunds
I’m not sure Clive would agree with this, nor would I to that matter. Crops that wintered well stopped growing in March.
No offence intended but I see your rape and saw pictures of Clive’s and it didn’t look great going in to winter