Today at work

[v8willy]

Got fed up of the wet weather this past few weeks so buggered off with a load.

Last man onto the boat

& off.
Who says wagons are no good for the long draw???

Few MX loaders & bits

Grass getting worked everywhere on the way back in north England / south Scotland

 

[v8willy]

Todays hi-tech job, turning this

into this

 

[Yorkshire lad]

Thanks. Just trying to show something from another farming environment. Thought some might be interested in something a bit different
Cotton is a perennial plant, but we grow it as an annual.
Part of the regulations / legislation of it being a GM crop is it must be terminated at the end of the season.

Fertiliser ? How long is a bit of string. There are effectively 2 cotton industries here. Irrigation, where yields are high, cotton is the dominant or only crop & inputs are very high. In those situations, then yes, a lot of fert is used.
Dryland ( ie, no itrigation ) cotton tends to be just another crop in a varied rotation of both cool season & warm season crops. Yields are lower because obviously water is the limiting factor, but inputs are very low. Fert rates are quite low or depending on rotation / history environmental conditions there may be no fert. Most of what we've been harvesting is dryland or very limited irrigation, which is where strippers are far better suited than pickers
I'm purely dryland on my own farm.

We have very little fungicide use here. Never heard of it being used in cotton, although I'm assuming there is some on the seed dressing - would have to check a bag label. I've never used fungicides on my wheat & that is quite normal here . . . Used to used fungicides on legumes prior to rain events, but I avoid doing that now. I really don't like fungicides / try to avoid there use at all times
Cotton is planted as a seed, once soil temps are high enough. 14 C & rising at 9.00am, in our spring. Harvested autumn / winter ( been doing this since March, about 2 weeks to finish )
Row spacing is generally based around 1 metre rows. Irrigation is planted "solid" - ie every row planted. Depending on stored soil moisture, geographical / environmental location, seasonal outlook, attitude to risk etc etc then dryland can be planted in any configuration from solid 1 m rows, single skip, double skip, 2m or even 3 m rows. The skip rows / wide rows are all about conserving stored soil moisture till later in the growing season as the roots grow across to access it. We rely on stored soil moisture, rather than expecting rain when we want it.
All dryland is planted zero till, most often into standing cereal straw, to conserve moisture.
I generally plant my cotton on single skip, but based on what I've seen this year & facing the fact our environment is getting hotter & dryer, I think I'll go out to 2 m rows in the future.
The planters use double disc openers ( for the most precise seed placement & minimal soil disturbance ) on a parallelogram, using precision seed boxes to singulate seed for precise seed spacings. Most common boxes are the JD vacuum meters, Kinze brush meters & you do see a few Monosem vacuum meters as well. But the JD boxes, either on JD Maxemerge planters or on other locally built machines.
I have posted detailed pics here before of both the seed meters & the disc openers, but don't have any on my phone now. The pics are my planter. A 12 m Norseman bar ( built locally ) with JD vacuum boxes. It also gets used for all my summer row crops & I recently planted my chickpeas ( cool season legume ) with it as I wanted the wide row spacings to get greater airflow between the rows, minimising disease & hopefully avoiding the use of fungicide ( chickies are vulnerable to fungal diseases ) by creating a dryer micro climate around the leaves.
Hope I've answered all your questions

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Thanks Roy
You have spent some time answering my questions
I find your posts fascinating I’m the opposite of your I spend a lot of time trying to get rid of water
My yields are always lower in a wet season
Maybe if I drill a hole right through the planet I could send you some water

 

[Farmer Roy]

Thanks Roy
You have spent some time answering my questions
I find your posts fascinating I’m the opposite of your I spend a lot of time trying to get rid of water
My yields are always lower in a wet season
Maybe if I drill a hole right through the planet I could send you some water

Haha - believe it or not, from 1998 - 2000 I was completely wiped out by floods ( I am on an alluvial flood plain, in pretty much the lowest point of it ) 3 years in a row. 98 I had 7 individual flood peaks that winter, the place was pretty much underwater from July to September. 2000 had the highest flood on record, just prior to wheat harvest. Wheat went completely under & swaths of windrowed canola were floating. Still haven't recovered financially yet from that ( as well as a divorce in 2006 ) one yet
Not planting a crop because it is too dry is still cheaper than planting a crop & spending all the money on it, then not getting to harvest it

 

[Bobthebuilder]

Pimp my ride, should’ve got a chrome 1 [emoji57]

Not much solid metal to be able to weld a patch on, also leaking at the flexi bit as well so had to bit the bullet and get a new 1

 

[bumkin]

View attachment 813574
Pimp my ride, should’ve got a chrome 1 [emoji57]
View attachment 813576
Not much solid metal to be able to weld a patch on, also leaking at the flexi bit as well so had to bit the bullet and get a new 1

bugger that looks expensive

 

[d williams]

Anybody want to guess how many bales there will be to the ac

​

 

[davidroberts30]

1 million bales.....

 

[polly tunnel]

Ready to open Pyo week later than last year

this are first year plants

and second years

and raspberries ready as well

 

[Bobthebuilder]

bugger that looks expensive

Yup, but thankfully I wasn’t paying personally

 

[Gator]

Worm, mark the ewes, worm, heptavac and ectofly the lambs

 

[Muddyroads]

The boys are prepped and off to work:

 

[sawdust]

Anybody want to guess how many bales there will be to the ac

​

Would help if we could see them...

+ let's see if you can top trump my weekend count off of 14 acres

 

[roscoe erf]

did a refurb on this Ifor new brake cables wheel bearing's led lights complete rewire new ramp flap, new anchor points and reboard run out of steam so will finish it tomorrow

 

[d williams]

Would help if we could see them...

+ let's see if you can top trump my weekend count off of 14 acres

I think there’s grease on lens try again

 

[sawdust]

I think there’s grease on lens try again

How many acres?

 

[d williams]

115 ac

 

[Nearly]

Had the trowel muppets here for building an office.

Then 20 minutes later the diggers from Northern (lack of) Powergrid turned up to bury my cables.

This is the same job I was quoted £18k for and I turned down. Then I found a set of low wires so they've decided to keep me safe.

Then a small fire on the loadall, I think stand-in driver had left handbrake on and it got hot.
The insurance assessor had just left after trying to beat us down on the last claim for £5700 water bill due to frost damaged pipes.

A neighbour called in while insurance bod was here to tell me our bull was challenging their bull through a boundary fence.

Oh for a quiet day tomorrow.

 

[sawdust]

115 ac

Have you baled it yet?
I'll guess 19 to the acre.

 

[davidroberts30]

Have you baled it yet?
I'll guess 19 to the acre.

Small bales?