P & K holiday

Poorbuthappy

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Devon
haven't bought any compound fertiliser here for over 10 years, even though we have a bit of wheat land too. We buy in feed and extra straw. All within NVZ rules. Do need to lime every now and again.
Just the terminology! ;-)

I am long familiar with the term and technique, it was what John Cherrington was describing in his books on farming in the early part of the 20C, using feedstuffs imported from the Empire, when it really was Cake that was fed!
Yep, it was 15+ years ago I worked for him.
(Feeling old now! Where did that 15 years go?)
Around same time I was questioning my agronomist for the quantity of p & k he was telling me to apply to cereals when I had indexes of around 4. And he'd just been telling me of the possibility of NVZ type restrictions being applied to P (or was it K?)
 

NeilT123

Member
Location
West Sussex
I had to do a Phosphate balance for an example farm as part of my NMP training. From memory P in came from bought in livestock & dairy feed and left the farm as sold animals and milk but I do remember that more P came in than went out.
 

Brisel

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Midlands
I had to do a Phosphate balance for an example farm as part of my NMP training. From memory P in came from bought in livestock & dairy feed and left the farm as sold animals and milk but I do remember that more P came in than went out.

I did the same for NMP. I believe that Northern Irish farmers have to do the phosphate balance equation as they've had major issues with phosphate pollution. Perhaps someone can verify this? @david ? I've heard talk of Phosphate Vulnerable Zones for years but nothing more than that. Phosphates were in the catchment criteria for Countryside Stewardship as well as nitrates, so I think the tide is turning. Sewage works are cleaning up their act which leaves agriculture next in the firing line. Wessex Water were talking about extending their Entrade scheme to cover phosphates - get a load of farmers to reduce their P emissions & they would save having to install P removal equipment at minor sewage works. https://www.entrade.co.uk/

Roger Sylvester-Bradley did some work on P index 1 being sufficient for some crops. It was in Farmers Weekly recently. I haven't looked in the FACTS library for further details but no doubt Ian Richards will dig something out on request.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 79 42.5%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 65 34.9%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 16.1%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 6 3.2%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

  • 1,287
  • 1
As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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