How much Harvest has been lost/abandoned in Scotland?

[jackstor]

Shocking bad in Cumbria too, lots of barley and 1st, 2nd and 3rd cuts of silage to get/abandoned. Slurry stores full going into winter and very little winter crop drilled.
1985 was bad but as has been said it came good in October. 2012 was a shocker too, it’s remembered for major fluke problems around here. I’m sure 2002 was a bad year as well and TBH since then we’ve had very few ‘proper’ summers.
Unfortunately bad summers are turning into the ‘norm’

 

[SMID]

The machinery capacity now compared to 85 is phenomenal theirs 22 + self propelleds inside 10 miles of here + all the wagons and balers , combines ? their would be more smaller ones then

 

[Alf]

Hmm.

Sorry guys, but I'm going to disagree that this year is worse than '85 , I don't think it is.

I remember the day we packed the woolbags. The rain started to thunder on the roof 'til we couldn't hear each other speak. We looked out the shed door, and it was like someone had draped a solid sheet of water over the shed door - it looked like you couldn't walk through it. I've never seen that since.

The local drainage contractor couldn't get his 4 wheel drive jeep up the brae behind the steading, and that's normally a rock hard brae. If you stepped on the ground, you heard the saturation squelch go out for 50 yards around you.

@miniconnect , ask your father if he remembers Tarbert Fair Day 1985?

There were calves being loaded onto floats for the sale in a lightning storm in the early hours. The day was black as night only lit by the lightning which flashed menacingly all day.

Farm roads washed away. The main trunk road was flooded every few miles and was threatened with closure in the morning. Traffic crawled along at a snails pace, it wasn't safe to travel at any speed.

Back in town for a wedding in the late afternoon, you couldn't hear the wedding service for the thunder and the unrelenting rain. The streets were flooded and we had no power at the farm all day. That was July 29th.

1985 was the year the local NFU organised a boatload of Canadian hay delivered into the local harbour to feed cattle through the Winter as forage was in such short supply. I've never seen that since.

Cattle have come through this year better than 1985. That year dragged the guts out of them and there were a lot of cows went down with staggers.

I've had this very conversation with others recently, and we'd all be in agreement with '85 being the worst year we've all ever seen.

this year was different . It just came steady but never stoped . I remember 85 and it was bad too

 

[Alf]

The machinery capacity now compared to 85 is phenomenal theirs 22 + self propelleds inside 10 miles of here + all the wagons and balers , combines ? their would be more smaller ones then

In 85 we where still making 10.000 + small bales

 

[Victor]

I do feel for you all up there even down here in Devon it's been a struggle couldn't miss any opportunity and the moisture meter was thrown away just to get the spring barley done however wet it was.
Hope some opportunities come your way and you have a better winter. Been telling farmers that "we've been here before" but hearing what you're going through up there it must be a struggle

 

[glasshouse]

This is am east west split, as the east side has managed not too bad.
Straw is a struggle behind BLeeding 30ft headers, especially rotaries.
In 85 the east was worse as all the wheat went flat in the highland show week of 23td june and was a disaster.
Peas were written off.
The upland guys got their barley ok that yr about 20th october, but the barley had little feed value, just a husk.
It was my first year out of college, i went against my old man and sprayed the wheat with straw shortener and ours was the only stuff standing in the county.
Osr that yr was a saviour, our first try, and big bale silage too, made before weather broke.
Dad went off to canada as i was cutting the hay, he returned 4wks later and it was still lying in water.

Plenty folk went bust that yr, and a lot of estates decided that they didnt like farming and let the land out

 

[multi power]

The machinery capacity now compared to 85 is phenomenal theirs 22 + self propelleds inside 10 miles of here + all the wagons and balers , combines ? their would be more smaller ones then

What would have taken a week to pick up is now done before dinner time

 

[sheepwise]

What would have taken a week to pick up is now done before dinner time

Not if you get the 20 tonne combine sunk to the tits in the first bout!

 

[glasshouse]

Not if you get the 20 tonne combine sunk to the tits in the first bout!

That is precisely the problem.
Thats when you need an old fashioned combine with the engine at the front over the drive wheels

 

[Hilly]

That is precisely the problem.
Thats when you need an old fashioned combine with the engine at the front over the drive wheels

Ive seen combines parked in gateways and corn thrown into them by hand on the islands.

 

[Speedstar]

That is precisely the problem.
Thats when you need an old fashioned combine with the engine at the front over the drive wheels

Or one on tracks , we had some at home were a wheel combine could not travel and cut it with one on tracks and never maked it

 

[glasshouse]

Or one on tracks , we had some at home were a wheel combine could not travel and cut it with one on tracks and never maked it

Aye but tracked combines too dear for most. And on the wrong side of the country

 

[deere 6600]

I well remember 85 a4 wheel drive tractor was anovelty and I'm not kidding the ol boys all reckoned it wood dry up sometime and it kind of did by now mid October a lot of us just get the finger out now cos we've seen it all before but it's still seriously crap and yes the old 400 Massey combine wi wide wheels wid nearly float !!!!!!

 

[michael N123]

Or one on tracks , we had some at home were a wheel combine could not travel and cut it with one on tracks and never maked it

We didnt even attempt using our own combine for 30 acre and got prudham in with his tracked newholland its amazing how well that thing travels

 

[Bossfarmer]

Here in the West of Scotland we have experienced the worst summer that I can remember with hardly a dry harvest day. We have 18 acres of barley still uncombined and probably now with this torrential rain it will only be salvaged by baling and wrapping.Up until Friday we also had 20 acres of spring oats (undersown with Italian for greening measure} still growing but we managed to get that mowed and chopped as very wet wholecrop on top of the pit. We are probably luckier than some as we had 15 acres of winter barley we got good grain and straw from at the beginning of August although the stubble turnips sown afterwards are pretty much a disaster being soured out with the constant rain.We had the contractor a month ago and did 20 acres of spring barley then, but regrettably allowed him to go away to keep other customers happy with the promise of being back in a week when our oats would be ripe to do with the rest of the barley.His combines are all sitting redundant on other farms with 300 acres uncut. Our silage situation has fairly been helped by getting the oat wholecrop into the pit but it will still be a challenge to see us through to spring especially now with a shortage of feeding straw.Again we were probably luckier than many in that although short on bulk our silage is of good enough quality as we were able to get the contractor for both cuts in rare weather windows. Everyone refers back to 1985 as the worst year in living memory but many around here consider 2017 much worse because in 1985 it did dry up in October which allowed most harvest and silage to be salvaged.I know of farmers this year who have had cows housed since July and no second cut in the pit.There are even some horror stories of some on really wet ground having no forage at all being forced to sell their stock.Probably in 1985 many farmers were dependant on making hay whereas now we don't think twice about getting the baler and wrapper out.
So just wondering what the situation is around the country as I know the north/east has also had it bad.

according to @Pasty farming in the West of Scotland is easy and the farmers should get no support

 

[beltbreaker]

Flew out of Glasgow 10 days ago, what was obvious was the amount of water lying in fields throughout Ayrshire. Total nightmare. Feel for you guys.

I have been loading Hesstons which are going as far away as West Cumbria and Ireland. There is a shortage of straw around here too

Back in 1985 I was on tattie holidays as an 11 year old and our then 3 men were off on holiday (bad planning), I spent the fortnight carting wheat and watching the driers while dad combined. All the neighbours would turn up every morning to bitch about the weather and drink coffee smoke fags and compare disaster/stuck stories and go and try and cut some crop.

We started in winter barley on July 27th got stuck doing that, finished peasin the frost one way on November 11 with the neighbours Matador as our 2 year old Massey deposited its fan in the grain tank while spitting its sieves and a walker out the back all within 2 minutes (dad is a man to keep going stocked on fags and coffee and by then not giving a flying fudge) . That winter we bought Hesston square baled straw from Romney Marsh a journey of 700+ miles. The driver hadn't been south of Perth and had to drop the trailer on the M1?? and drag it under flyovers with a chain or so he told me.

Cheers BB

 

[Pasty]

according to @Pasty farming in the West of Scotland is easy and the farmers should get no support

At the moment I can't get a tractor on any but 1 of my fields and that would make a mess. UTV is about the only thing and then you have to go steady. I expect it to be that way until April. Heavy clay and steep slopes here. Flat fields are already under water so can't put sheep on them. We all have our challenges. Some won't ever get enough water or pray for a bit of clay in the soil. Just have to make the best of what you have.

 

[Chae1]

Some of our straw in 30ft bouts. Good germination.

 

[bobk]

View attachment 593348

Some of our straw in 30ft bouts. Good germination.

What's the plan ?

 

[Chae1]

What's the plan ?

It's baled now! Wuffler once then turned it over with single rotor rake, wuffled it another twice. Over a period of ten days where we'd a lot of wind. Was far from perfect but it's been trading for up to £20 for a 4.5 ft bale up here so it all counts.

It was straw we'd bought in bout. Not our combine.