Improving WW yields

[Theswede]

I have since coming home to the family farm, improved the WW yields from 5t/ha up to 7t/ha due to putting in alot more effort in growing WW than my brother did before me (He has always been alot more into cows). This year I have been digging down irrigation throughout most of the farm and built a water reserve which will give me the possibillity to add around 100 mm/ha of water to this years WW crop. Since we most years have pretty long dry spells through june-aug I think the irrigation will boost the WW at least 2-3 t/ha. Now when I have the irrigation in place, my brain immidiately starts to think of the next possible action to increase yield/profit even more...

Tim Lamyman has got a lot of attention even in the Swedish magazines about his record yields, this got me reading a bit about it and then I ended up checking out bionatureagriculture.com who provide the 1-4-All micronutrition. Is this commonly used in the UK or has it just hit the market? Is it possible to gain profit/yield from using the 1-4-All on "ordinary land" or is it just that Tim Lamyman has got extraordinary soils along with good timing in all his applications?

Or is there maybe some other way to improve yields that will increase the profit more? Today I run a half-intensive fungicide program with three applications with pretty low rates. N is provided by NS27-4 and N34 three times during season, cow muck is spread prior to drilling. Any thoughts/discussions welcome!

 

[Clive]

1-4-all isn't "15t in a can" - it's mostly Ca IIRC ? - there is no single product that can do that

I think a lot of muck, N and a massive VC spend is the reason behind the world record yield

I would focus on growing a profitable crop and not a world record one, it will pay the rent unlike a world record crop


I also think I'm right in saying that TL has some kind of commercial interest in the company that sell 1-4-all ? at least I have been told this is the case ? anyone know more ?

 

[franklin]

Soil?
Existing N / fungicide program?
How much sunlight / heat do you get?
Is it feed wheat or for milling?
What products do you have available? I'm thinking fungicides / growth regulators?
Do you need the straw? Would you be sad with a shorter crop but with more grain?

 

[Pieces_of_Eight]

+1 what Clive said.

If you want to be world famous like TL, then 'dedication's what you need'.

If you just want to pay the bills, aim for a yield that will cover your costs (whatever they may be).

Lots of agricultural sectors have ended up with high input + high output systems that do not pay the bills any better than extensive alternatives. (Look at extreme holsteins for example)

 

[Brisel]

It sounds like you have the right ideas. The record yields are achieved with lots of nitrogen 300 kg/ha+, plant growth regulators to keep it standing, excellent soil management (this is a vast subject by itself!) and good nutrition, all correctly timed.

As above, yields here are limited by water, solar radiation, disease, weeds, pests and soil health. Our higher annual rainfall & the little-and-often rainfall patterns help considerably, though this also provides a microclimate for crop disease to build up in the canopy. If you have limiting factors like soil type then a very high input/output programme isn't always the way to the highest net margin. There are a few TFF members on low input programmes who achieve good profit margins by NOT spending a fortune on fungicides.

 

[SilliamWhale]

300 kg/ha of N is about 106kg/ha more than I normally use to try and get my 4t/acre average (which I don't get)

I'm sometimes tempted to experiment with more N but the weather may not play ball to give me the extra yield.

 

[Chalky]

Tim Lamyman's (former & almost) record is interesting.

That land is not the usual heavy yielding crop land(silts/esturine/reclaimed/brickearth). It is largely thinnish wold, steep in places.

Attention to detail obviously; muck, fairly friendly rotation(not wheat every other year), lots of N(or a substituted source of), lots of general nutrition & sufficient fung/pgr.

The Rod Smith record is on heavier land- that will lie wetter at times, no OSR, cool North sea Northumberland- lots of K & muck. Wider rotation as before & plenty pgr/fung. All things that are not out of the ordinary. He will use a lot of N & therefore a lot of pgr/fung to keep the lush canopy clean. If the season is right- shows what can be done.

If you take the value of 10T & the value of 13/14 T of wheat(lets forget the 16T) it pays for over £300/ha of inputs. THAT is a lot of inputs. Which are the ones that give the biggest payback?

I think berating these chaps & suggesting they have 'bought all their yield' is a bit churlish really. We all buy our yield with every input we use. Its all about marginal benefit. Maybe we should look at ourselves a little harder & ask why we cannot do more with what we have got?

 

[Fuzzy]

1-4-all isn't "15t in a can" - it's mostly Ca IIRC ? - there is no single product that can do that

I think a lot of muck, N and a massive VC spend is the reason behind the world record yield

I would focus on growing a profitable crop and not a world record one, it will pay the rent unlike a world record crop


I also think I'm right in saying that TL has some kind of commercial interest in the company that sell 1-4-all ? at least I have been told this is the case ? anyone know more ?

As it happens i have been using this product for 3 years, but i didnt realise it as 1-4-all does not appear on the invoice!!! So guess which of the last 3 years has produced record yields for us, and then guess which year i decided not to apply it and save it for the following year ???

 

[SilliamWhale]

I think berating these chaps & suggesting they have 'bought all their yield' is a bit churlish really. We all buy our yield with every input we use. Its all about marginal benefit. Maybe we should look at ourselves a little harder & ask why we cannot do more with what we have got?

I agree with you but personally I don't like reading too much bombast without the detail. They are entitled not to give all the detail of course.

 

[Brisel]

I think berating these chaps & suggesting they have 'bought all their yield' is a bit churlish really. We all buy our yield with every input we use. Its all about marginal benefit. Maybe we should look at ourselves a little harder & ask why we cannot do more with what we have got?

I don't see any berating in this thread. I think it is great to see what can be achieved, though I'm glad it's not me doing the speculating. Spending £150/ha on Bionature products chasing the full potential on soils that are less than 10" deep is commercial suicide.

@Theswede - try searching for the ADAS YEN Yield Enhancement Network. They are also trying to achieve the maximum potential yield for a given soil type.

What would be great for us would be a crystal ball or model that would tell us what our yield potential is at any stage during the spring from stem extension onwards, so we would have a better clue as to how hard to try. If we did, I might use it to predict market prices instead so I can clean up Then I'd be able to buy a bigger farm & have a manager try to beat the yield record for me!

 

[Chalky]

I would focus on growing a profitable crop and not a world record one, it will pay the rent unlike a world record crop

Sounds like what then...?

 

[Chalky]

Brisel,

TL farms soil very much like your downland & my wold land- similar stuff. You have more disease risk, but probably less drought potential because of where you are.

 

[Theswede]

It seems like I wasn't clear enough with my aspect of the yield vs profit in my first post. The goal has never been to grow a world record crop, but that doesn't mean that I shouldn't look at what he has done and try to apply that to my own farming and the conditions that are on my fields and in my crops...

Up until now the dry spells have been the biggest limiting factor by far for me, and after years of calculating and planning I decided to build an irrigation system to limit the impact of the dry spells, and this was not because I wanted the biggest crop ever known to man, this was because all calculations points towards a greater profit although the higher input. But now that I have limited the impact of the dry spells on my crop, there is something else that is my most limiting factor. Since I have not even grown crops under these circumstances for one year, it is impossible for me to know for sure what that factor is. But since I enjoy growing crops and do like to try to be one step ahead I can't stop myself from thinking of what my next possible move should be... and after reading a bit about micro nutrigen it got me interested. When I think about it I do believe that the micro-nutrition could be a big part of the plants ability to gain yield, and/or profit. Since micro-nutrition in Sweden is very limited there is not much know-how, doesn't matter if I talk to my neighbour or my agronomist. But I figured, maybe you guys were a bit ahead of us in the UK.

I'm not sure that my english is good enough to translate my soiltypes correct, but I think it can be translated as a moraine/light clay kind of soil. Anyway the soil is pretty good although not perfect. Since our farm has been concentrating on dairy production for many years, there has been alot of grass in the rotation making weed problems, and diseases linked to intense cereal production, very small. When it comes to milling or feed wheat, we generally get better profits growing feed wheat in my area. We do bale most of the straw, although we are not close to short on it so anything that makes the amount of straw smaller, won't bother me. Since this is the first year growing crops with irrigation I'm not quite sure of N levels, but my plan for now is to apply N three times except for the muck when drilled.
1. 160 kg of NS 27-4
2. 300 kg of NS 27-4
3. 100 kg of N 34
This equals close to 170 kg of N (including muck) on top of what my soils provide extra.

Last years most common spray programme was:
Oct: 0,5 L Cougar / 2,0 L Manganese 235
Nov: 2,0 L Manganese 235
May: 2,5 L Ariane S / 2,0 L Manganese 235 / 0,15 L Tilt 250 EC
Early june: 0,3 L Comet Pro / 0,3 L Proline
Mid june: 0,3 L Proline
The results of this programme was good, a maybe I would have wanted to hit the yellow rust a little bit harder.

I haven't got a clue wether these products are used in the UK or not, I suppose not since the Swedish governments always try to be "the best in the world" and generally seems to be the country in the world who excludes available products first.

 

[Brisel]

Cougar & Ariane are herbicides according to a search online. The rest we have here. That's a very low fungicide input compared to ours but the lack of rainfall & rust chemicals shows that too.

It seems like I wasn't clear enough with my aspect of the yield vs profit in my first post. The goal has never been to grow a world record crop, but that doesn't mean that I shouldn't look at what he has done and try to apply that to my own farming and the conditions that are on my fields and in my crops...

That's what we're all hoping to do.

 

[franklin]

Cougar = 500gai/ L isporoturon + 100gai/L DFF
Ariane S = clopyralid? Not sure on this one.
Tilt 250 EC = 250gai propiconazole
Comet Pro = 200gai/L pyraclastrobin

Or I think that's correct. So you should be pleased, as farmers here are still sad that UK government has banned IPU! Our government also likes to ban chemicals.

So your fungide program would seem very small to us, although I know you are not allowed to use the same chemicals as us.

At 7t/ha from 170kg/ha N thats 25kg bagged N per ton of grain. For a feed wheat that is not un-usual. Do you know what % protein your grain was last year?

Does your wheat seem overly thick or thin in number of ears per metre? I couldnt see a growth regulator (chlormequat or trinexapac?) used?

 

[Brisel]

Ariane = clopyralid + MCPA + fluroxypyr

 

[Brisel]

Brisel,

TL farms soil very much like your downland & my wold land- similar stuff. You have more disease risk, but probably less drought potential because of where you are.

I know the area around Worlaby, though not as well as you. What would you say the yield potential is for these soils?

10.2 t/ha Santiago wheat in this spot this year! Edit: usual yield is sub 7t/ha

11.3 t/ha Volume winter barley this year! The topsoil at depth is due to previous passes with a subsoiler & a bit of topsoil falling down when this was dug as a bund to contain a sewage cake heap liquifying and running off in Jan 2013. Edit: usual yield is a lot less than that. Until the sewage cake episode

As you say, the potential is there...

 

[Theswede]

Cougar = 500gai/ L isporoturon + 100gai/L DFF
Ariane S = clopyralid? Not sure on this one.
Tilt 250 EC = 250gai propiconazole
Comet Pro = 200gai/L pyraclastrobin

Or I think that's correct. So you should be pleased, as farmers here are still sad that UK government has banned IPU! Our government also likes to ban chemicals.

So your fungide program would seem very small to us, although I know you are not allowed to use the same chemicals as us.

At 7t/ha from 170kg/ha N thats 25kg bagged N per ton of grain. For a feed wheat that is not un-usual. Do you know what % protein your grain was last year?

Does your wheat seem overly thick or thin in number of ears per metre? I couldnt see a growth regulator (chlormequat or trinexapac?) used?

My protein was between 10,9 and 11,2% last year. But that was with 7 t/ha and applying 150 kg of N. The 170 kg of N is for next year, when the irrigation is working.

No growth regulator was used because with normal weather conditions over here it is not profitable to add as much N as needed to be in the risk zone of getting a wheat that wont stand up.

 

[yellow belly]

one of the big advantage the land at worlaby has is cool temperatures 450 ft up chalk based soils that hold moisture like much deeper soil but are also free draining
heavier soil further south will suffer hotter temperatues in the summer which compromise yield
the other attributes are Tims attention to detail every m2 will produce maximum yield and for record breaking crops the field will be measured without cross compliance strips
there is also a very good shoot on the farm with a lot of days let

many of use do not apply enough nitrogen to grow more than 10 tonnes per ha but our best field could probably profitably benefit from higher rates off the headlands in the middle of the field
200 kg of n is removed by 11 tonne of grain a field that averages 10 tonnes will have to yield 12 t from the middle unless it is over 30 acres

 

[7800]

It's interesting that the world record that beat TL did not use a liquid nutrient programme. As said before it's not 15 t/ha in a can ,