A 20yo CO6 is 20grand, before you start converting it. Needs a big horse to pull it too. You're at new 3m Moore/Simtech money...and only need a smallish tractor. Good for 500ac, with a spread of crops, and you have a new machine, not one you can't pull that's already done a gazillion acres.
What is wrong with returning to ploughing?
- Thread starter Two Tone
- Start date
- Location
- East meath/dublin
It changes almost Daily but i would say that keeping the yield and lowering the cost would be the sweet spot !! Mind you somtimes left is right and right is left if you know what i mean . Bit like the milk atm with high solids and winter bonuses the price a litre makes the May price look medicore .
- Location
- Darlington
I keep looking at these Simtechs and wonder 'what's the catch?' I saw it working at Groundswell and it was dwarfed by the other drills but was doing, what looked like, a similar job.
It looks like how I would like a drill to look.
- Location
- East meath/dublin
I spent a day at the demo event in Oak park a few years ago where all the dd drills were put through their paces . To my eye the all appeared to be doing a good job of placing and covering seed but Oak park is Gods own land and would be very different to my mud pie . But youre right the simtech looks capable and affordable and probably be best for a start .
- Location
- Darlington
I've spoken to him
I have only just seen this thread, but from
my own experience on thin Cotswold brash,
ploughing to control weeds was not very successful due to such shallow soil , which doesn’t scour off plough mouldboards very well , so soil was just pushed to one side rather than inverted.
If one farms a good depth of soil that would be a different story.
my own experience on thin Cotswold brash,
ploughing to control weeds was not very successful due to such shallow soil , which doesn’t scour off plough mouldboards very well , so soil was just pushed to one side rather than inverted.
If one farms a good depth of soil that would be a different story.
- Location
- Moreton-in-Marsh, Glos
Although I am in the Cotswolds, I don’t actually have any Cotswold Brash. I do have some Banbury Ironstone which is rather similar, is very stony and a bugger to plough especially as it is all very banky. It does not like being ploughed up hill and it does seem to DD quite well (so far!).
The title of this thread was started with reference to returning to the Plough from Min-till rather than from DD.
I certainly found on this farm that so called Min-till, was no cheaper than ploughing and was actually Max-cost when it came to weed control, which just got worse and worse. Yields also went down primarily due to the worsening weed, especially BG situation. Returning to ploughing (properly!) got this situation back under control.
I am experimenting with DD to see how well it will work ahead of the direction that ELMS will hopefully encourage us go. So far I am encouraged by the results.
However, it took that returning to the plough for 4 years to get my BG situation back under control enough, before I dared attempt DD. I still have about a third of the farm that will need another year, or maybe 2 before I will DD it.
But I’m reasonably certain that it will eventually DD. And it must be done with absolutely the minimum of soil disturbance possible. Hence going straight for the Weaving GD, rather than starting off with a tine drill.
I have min till gear too. Old and nackered but does a job.
Dim Reaper
Member
- Location
- North Yorkshire
There isn’t a catch. They just don’t have the glossy marketing to make them the latest arable fashion accessory. Maybe not a bad thing.
- Location
- Darlington
No don't think so. I had a manic few days when the last technology grants were available but the words Haste and repent at leisure started to spin around in my head.
yellow belly
Member
- Location
- south west lincolnshire
If you work more than 4 inches deep it is not min till more like vertical ploughing
min till back when straw could be burnt was 2 inches maximum
ploughing straw to the bottom of the furrow in a wet year on heavy land was not very profitable
min till back when straw could be burnt was 2 inches maximum
ploughing straw to the bottom of the furrow in a wet year on heavy land was not very profitable
Hereward
Member
- Location
- Peterborough
I've been tempted by a Simtech before, could it cope with drilling an AB9 stewardship mix into a messy fallow and then subsequently drilling AB9 seed into a sprayed off AB9?
It's this type of scenario where I think ploughing is the only option, perhaps I'm being to blinkered.
Likewise drilling WW into a messy extended overwinter stubble?
And I will have wheelings to deal with it, the hedge cutter, combine etc. I know I can have fixed tramlines.
It's this type of scenario where I think ploughing is the only option, perhaps I'm being to blinkered.
Likewise drilling WW into a messy extended overwinter stubble?
And I will have wheelings to deal with it, the hedge cutter, combine etc. I know I can have fixed tramlines.
I’ve found the best way is to top off the AB9 and then glyphosate and then direct drill into that at least 4 weeks later, but the longer the better as our soil stays wet so needs the cover removing to dry out.