Written by cpm
Download PDF Cambs grower Hannah Derby has soils that don’t resemble any you’d find in small-plot trials, nor even on other farms. CPM visits to find out how that’s shaped her approach to on-farm trials. With soils as unique as these, if you don’t do you own trials you never understand what works on your own farm. By Tom Allen-Stevens At the edge of the field, it looks as though someone’s emptied a small bag of compost into a neat heap. It is, in fact, a molehill, that illustrates the nature of this land – in a nation that struggles to reach 2% organic matter across much of its arable soils, this field has levels that exceed 40%. So while most growers seek to build organic matter, Hannah Darby, who farms with her uncle, Tony, strives to manage the levels they have across some of the 360ha they farm, based at Sawtry, Cambs. “The soil is unique and the farm lies in a basin at around sea level. While the soil has its advantages, we struggle with issues, such as mildew, that few others do. Our farm is so different to anyone else’s we can’t rely on small-plot trials or…
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