Traditional mixed Farming

[Kevtherev]

Lot of doom and gloom on here regarding the removal of subs brexit etc etc
Bringing back mixed Farming with livestock in the arable rotation is the way forward I believe.
No doubt some will disagree?
Fert and fancy Machinery will be first to suffer.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

I agree.
The degenerative destructive model has run its race if you want my opinion.
Politics will likely dictate that we all pull out the stops to preserve the environment, not pay people to pull ploughs around.

I think regenerative agricultural methods, and more holistic approaches are going to be crucial, just as happened in much of the grain belt in the US, Australia etc.

Unfortunately the UK livestock model has put a huge price on straw etc, which ideally would be left standing for the next crop.

But, if you breed it in, it's hard to bray it out.. I do feel future environmental payments will likely focus on much more than wildlife strips and hedgecutting season being observed.

Good time to look sideways and behind us.
But most of all, at what's under our feet.

 

[DRC]

Lot of doom and gloom on here regarding the removal of subs brexit etc etc
Bringing back mixed Farming with livestock in the arable rotation is the way forward I believe.
No doubt some will disagree?
Fert and fancy Machinery will be first to suffer.

Depends a lot on availability of labour on farms. Can’t see sheep being very profitable after Brexit and less youngsters want the tie of stock. Regrettably Kev, but if your a one man band like me, it’s easier and less of a tie, not to have much livestock. No one around to look after them if I want time off or am Ill
I can’t see many big Arable farms in the East having the skills or infrastructure to suddenly go back to livestock farming.

 

[Kevtherev]

It might be a case of having to though @silverfox
Grass and livestock to rest the land and combat blackgrass?
Clover to fix nitrogen and improve the soils.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Depends a lot on availability of labour on farms. Can’t see sheep being very profitable after Brexit and less youngsters want the tie of stock. Regrettably Kev, but if your a one man band like me, it’s easier and less of a tie, not to have much livestock. No one around to look after them if I want time off or am Ill
I can’t see many big Arable farms in the East having the skills or infrastructure to suddenly go back to livestock farming.

Is the contract grazer/ share-farming model worthy of mention?
Young folk like @unlacedgecko who can't get a look at a land purchase, running livestock outside of the arable operation?

 

[msheep66]

I believe its all about supply and demand. There needs to be less supply which would then create higher prices with more demand. This needs to be worldwide thing though as supermarkets will just import the food if they can't buy it here.

 

[DRC]

It might be a case of having to though @silverfox
Grass and livestock to rest the land and combat blackgrass?
Clover to fix nitrogen and improve the soils.

I agree in an ideal world, but what type of livestock?, and do you lads up country, really want every barley baron keeping sheep or cattle on the better land.

 

[gone up the hill]

It might be a case of having to though @silverfox
Grass and livestock to rest the land and combat blackgrass?
Clover to fix nitrogen and improve the soils.

Wont happen, the cost of actually buying stock/ sheds/ machinery/ getting staff to do the work etc etc means it will be unviable.

If anything after Brexit farms will get more specific.

 

[DRC]

It might be a case of having to though @silverfox
Grass and livestock to rest the land and combat blackgrass?
Clover to fix nitrogen and improve the soils.

Maybe more AD plants using grass breaks as part of the fuel stock, with the digestste going back on the land, or intensive feedlots or pig units.

 

[Kevtherev]

I agree in an ideal world, but what type of livestock?, and do you lads up country, really want every barley baron keeping sheep or cattle on the better land.

Store cattle sent down from upland units to fatten on outdoor roots in the drier parts of the uk i was thinking?

 

[Sonoftheheir]

Won’t happen around here. People will sell up to the big boys rather than that. And they won’t go into livestock either.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

It might be a case of having to though @silverfox
Grass and livestock to rest the land and combat blackgrass?
Clover to fix nitrogen and improve the soils.

"Edible cover cropping"
I've been watching farmers here grow a cereal cashcrop every other year through red and white clover covers, purely to keep costly weeds like wild oats wild turnip etc out of the loop.

It doesn't need to yield to pay well, neither do the livestock, because the costs of producing either are so low.

Wait for the storm to hit @Kevtherev

Coming will be 134 reasons why it won't work a problem for every solution no doubt.

 

[Kevtherev]

What if there are environmental linked payment schemes to keep livestock in a rotation system then?

 

[Kiwi Pete]

"Edible cover cropping"
I've been watching farmers here grow a cereal cashcrop every other year through red and white clover covers, purely to keep costly weeds like wild oats wild turnip etc out of the loop.

It doesn't need to yield to pay well, neither do the livestock, because the costs of producing either are so low.

Wait for the storm to hit @Kevtherev

Coming will be 134 reasons why it won't work a problem for every solution no doubt.

Oh look, I was right

 

[DrWazzock]

We have been mixed for the last 10 years after being all arable for the 20 years before that. I was just a lad when we got rid of the stock then saw the land deteriorate. For that reason we got back into stock but agree you need to be fit and able to handle sheep...which is why my brother looks after them. I look after the cattle as they don't need shearing and even I can operate the crush,

Certainly it needs a new approach though. We are also direct drilling more and more and returning straw direct to the soil, not so much through the cattle yards. So I am trying to outwinter the cattle to save on straw and the work of bedding then hauling all that muck back out and burning fuel to spread it. I hope to ranch the cattle eventually, with a lighter hardier breed that doesn't need vast amounts of cake to finish. British Whites at present crossed with a white shorthorn. They have grown a good coat and seem to do well outside. We also grow fodder beet for the sheep but I am presently asking myself now sensible it is to cast it all into a heap then cart it all back out again for the sheep on the fields in winter when it's wet.

There is still much to do to make the system more efficient, more natural, less intensive, less damaging, less stressful for man and beast, more balanced.

We do seem to have created a huge amount of work and expense for ourselves in farming during the twentieth century. I think the twenty first will see a more sustainable system develop, that requires less synthetic chemical and fossil fuel energy input.

 

[beltbreaker]

Big drop up here in the number of sheep in the hills, but actual sheep numbers up due to more lower people putting sheep on and increasing flock size. Cattle on the other hand are evaporating in the hills but low ground numbers decreasing too.

As a traditional mixed farmer I suspect the cream of my arable cropping comes from the 800 tonnes of cattle muck, 1million litres of pig slurry and the sheep on stubble neeps over 400 arable acres.

It's only the last 3 years I have stopped taking the soil for granted and the more I learn the less I seem to know. TFF, monitor farms and other such groups have helped my farming head no end over the years. I like being helped by others to help ourselves and vice versa.

I would like to think we will see a return to mixed farming and the use of share farming may provide an answer although I suspect it will be the BTO (Big Time Operators) who can dazzle the mustard trousers with bullsh!t have scale on their side and then drive the rent down yr2 because they aren't making enough.

Cheers BB

 

[Kiwi Pete]

What if there are environmental linked payment schemes to keep livestock in a rotation system then?

With the "sudden" focus on soil's storage of carbon, it will only be a matter of waiting for it to happen.
No-till may give the feel-good factor, but continual growing cover and ruminants are the only way to speed the process.
An awful lot of carbon goes out the gate and nitrogen application doesn't do anything to sequester more- the opposite is evident in studies.

 

[Kevtherev]

Top post @DrWazzock exactly the sort of system I’m talking about.
Some can’t see the wood for the trees until it’s too late

 

[DRC]

We have been mixed for the last 10 years after being all arable for the 20 years before that. I was just a lad when we got rid of the stock then saw the land deteriorate. For that reason we got back into stock but agree you need to be fit and able to handle sheep...which is why my brother looks after them. I look after the cattle as they don't need shearing and even I can operate the crush,

Certainly it needs a new approach though. We are also direct drilling more and more and returning straw direct to the soil, not so much through the cattle yards. So I am trying to outwinter the cattle to save on straw and the work of bedding then hauling all that muck back out and burning fuel to spread it. I hope to ranch the cattle eventually, with a lighter hardier breed that doesn't need vast amounts of cake to finish. British Whites at present crossed with a white shorthorn. They have grown a good coat and seem to do well outside. We also grow fodder beet for the sheep but I am presently asking myself now sensible it is to cast it all into a heap then cart it all back out again for the sheep on the fields in winter when it's wet.

There is still much to do to make the system more efficient, more natural, less intensive, less damaging, less stressful for man and beast, more balanced.

We do seem to have created a huge amount of work and expense for ourselves in farming during the twentieth century. I think the twenty first will see a more sustainable system develop, that requires less synthetic chemical and fossil fuel energy input.

quite rare though , in having your brother and father still working with you on a manageable acreage . We used to keep 160 cattle and lamb a flock of 200 sheep, plus fatten a few pigs for BOCM Pauls!, with my dad and a full time man.
I’m 55 and my back won’t stand turning sheep or lambing these days. Luckily I can grow maize for a farm milking 850 cows and maize/ rye for an AD plant, plus do a straw for muck swap with a local pig farm, meaning I only have to harvest less than half the 400 acres myself .
We’ve become a support farm for other specialist farms

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Wood for the trees is right.
Unfortunately the extreme green movement would like to see the world covered in trees.
It's unfortunate that they don't all eat paper then, isn't it?
With payments being made for tree planting for the purpose of carbon sinking, why aren't grassland farmers getting it too - I've asked this one before so it likely doesn't need to take over the thread.

But the hidden KPI in farm resilience and long term profitability is soil health.
Not a new concept at all, I'm just glad to have adopted it early.

But I think the main hindrance to progress overseas is folk have to be led, by payments, because they're well attuned to the carrot-and-stick