bobajob
Member
- Location
- Sw Scotland
Sampling costs between £10- £20 a field. Depends how detailed a sample you want.
Will fert come down in price ?
- Thread starter valtraman
- Start date
livestock 1
Member
If you tell some of them you will buy a decent amount of fert off them they will do it for nowt
I got mine done that way
ollie989898
Member
Depends how many fields there, are do the whole lot in one fell swoop, at least then you will know which fields need what and where the muck and slurry or digestate really need to go. You will in all likelihood get better grass or crop growth as well.
livestock 1
Member
Lime saves a lot of wasted fert too
If ph is one point out half the fert doesn’t get used
If ph is one point out half the fert doesn’t get used
livestock 1
Member
The ground I have done bears no comparison to the rest crops and grazes much better not a cheap hobby though
ollie989898
Member
Can't tell you without soil tests. My guess is as good as anyone, could be spot on, miles too short, or hugely oversupplying. Two of those are going to cost you money.
You all need to be thinking how much manure or slurry does my farm generate. Then get RB209 out and work out roughly how much P and K that represents.
You can then allocate it to your silaging/grazing areas, and you know what you don't have to buy in.
As a very very rough rule of thumb, a unit with a medium stocking rate, and with half decent grass leys (weed grasses do not bulk or yield as much in reality), could well be looking to put on around 80 or even 90 units of nitrogen per acre for first cut.
Depending on their general feel for the fertility on the place, they are probably doing that with just N and S, or possibly something like 27.5.5 (this stuff is NOT cheap). Just putting on 20.10.10 endlessly is mental in my book and I spent much of my time point folk away from it.
Every time you reseed or stick a plough in the ground do a soil test first first, correct the P and K with 0.24.24- it isn't going anywhere and then apply the nitrogen when the crop wants it.
Plants rely on P and K reserves to sustain them over winter and keep them healthy. You can see this where a guy puts slurry on last thing in the autumn, the grass stays greener, thicker and healthier over winter than where it is hungry. It is also faster to respond to any N applied in the spring.
You do not need an agronomist or advisor or anyone to pull soil tests, mix, bag and pop them in the post to the Lab at Pocklington. It is literally chickenfeed money compared to the thousands people spend on fertiliser.
You will get better crops, more yield and quality and have potentially healthier stock, lower feed bills and you will be doing less harm to the environment, (your land) as well.
Products like 24.0.11 or 24.4.14 are heavier on the potash side and generally better for applying to land that has already had its first cut, as the potash is put back when the first haul of silage removed it. Be careful with potash on grazing land and where slurry is going on as well. It is not cheap.
Also bear in mind the 2 units of nitrogen per day of rest rule as well. If the conditions are not ideal for growth, stretch the intervals wider to make a bigger margin for safety.
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davidroberts30
Member
- Location
- pembrokeshire
I find it amusing that farmers begrudge paying £60a acre for 2 ton of lime every 5 year but will happily spend £40-50a acre on fert thats gone in 8 weeks..
livestock 1
Member
Never a truer word spoken
When fert got near £200 I started to put a lot more lime on
ollie989898
Member
Lime needs to be put right first and foremost as without it everything can be really curtailed by it. It is so cheap by comparison there is no reason to do it, it pays you back for several years and can be done when returns are good, then postponed if finances don't allow. It's not ideal but it is better than nothing.
livestock 1
Member
Probably why a lot postpone it indefinitely
Roger Perry
Member
Fert prices have held steady for the most part, there is a lot of natural gas and oil around.
When they get this new pipeline from the Permion basin completed there will be even more.
Cowabunga
Member
- Location
- Ceredigion,Wales
Fertiliser prices! Hmm! 
My take on it is that the Pound has dropped and will continue to drop for a few months yet, at least. This means price increases.
Put it into some kind of perspective though. In 1975, ICI was selling Nitram at £60/ton, due to a very lucrative North Sea natural gas long term contract which saw them able to monopolise the UK market at that price, when other ammonium nitrate manufacturers needed to sell at £80/ton, but couldn't due to ICI's aggressive pricing.
The point being that £60/ton in 1975 is equivalent to £600/ton today near as damnit. Check it out for yourselves if you like and don't trust me.
£80/ton adjusted to today's Pound value is £800/ton.
Of course a ton and a half of feed barley would pay for a ton of Nitram back then but, come to think of it, that isn't so far off todays position either.
Or can someone illustrate an alternative perspective?
My take on it is that the Pound has dropped and will continue to drop for a few months yet, at least. This means price increases.
Put it into some kind of perspective though. In 1975, ICI was selling Nitram at £60/ton, due to a very lucrative North Sea natural gas long term contract which saw them able to monopolise the UK market at that price, when other ammonium nitrate manufacturers needed to sell at £80/ton, but couldn't due to ICI's aggressive pricing.
The point being that £60/ton in 1975 is equivalent to £600/ton today near as damnit. Check it out for yourselves if you like and don't trust me.
£80/ton adjusted to today's Pound value is £800/ton.
Of course a ton and a half of feed barley would pay for a ton of Nitram back then but, come to think of it, that isn't so far off todays position either.
Or can someone illustrate an alternative perspective?
My previous post in this thread has a link to an article on how tariffs work in the Uk fertiliser market.
Exfarmer
Member
- Location
- Bury St Edmunds
Says the man selling forage
icanshootwell
Member
- Location
- Ross-on-wye
Use slag on grassland if low ph, your grass will respond.
Cowabunga
Member
- Location
- Ceredigion,Wales
Says the man selling forage
Who I believe used to use 2 units of N for each growing day up till mid Summer to make the most efficient use of the cheapest cow feed available to produce milk at the highest profit margin. Grass.
Yes, of course 'some' grass will grow without fertiliser. But even grazed grass needs around 30 units P and 30K per year, plus the muck recycled. Plus however much N is needed to produce for the number of stock carried and so on. It is all very scientific, although some people muddle through and others rape the land of its fertility.
Tarw Coch
Member
- Location
- Bottom of Wats Dyke
Costs me about £11 a sample, guy I buy my lime and Fert off does it and sends it to lancrop laboratories.
I have to do it at least every 4 years as I’m in an NVZ.
Threw up a bit of a surprise at first, had always concerted muck applications on silage ground as we were taking out of them but grazing ground was getting muck naturally., it was the grazing ground that was low in P and K so needed more muck.
Cowabunga
Member
- Location
- Ceredigion,Wales
That's often the case where ground is uneven and/or cows tend to concentrate in certain areas of fields. Also where they have to walk a distance to be milked and take a while on the farmyard to be milked. The result being that not more than half the much is deposited by the cattle on the grazing fields, let alone uniformly over it. Which is a mixed blessing all in all, because there is less spoilage and waste as the grazing season progresses and it gives more management possibilities to distribute muck unevenly over the area as needed once the grazing season has subsided.
I find this difficult in most years, because I need every square inch of grazing land to actually graze, until it gets too wet to spread muck. This year included, when I actually had a contractor booked but he dilly-dallied and found his bed chains had stretched and one thing and another, over a two week period, until it RAINED of course. Now we are deluged and there's little hope before the grass grows too long again in Spring.
Tarw Coch
Member
- Location
- Bottom of Wats Dyke
We noticed the problem of lower indices on the fields carrying young stock too where there would be no issue of depositing muck more one end than other as walking to milking and also as most is strip grazed for millers which does give opportunity for more muck to be deposited nearer the gate as cows have access to that end of the field for longer.
Like you, despite ground conditions being good into the autumn I haven’t got as much muck out as I’d have liked, grazing has been precious this autumn which has made finding an opportunity to get muck on a problem. I hate the term “getting rid of muck” but the easiest place to get rid of it is on land being cropped/reseeded but being in an NVZ there are restrictions on just how much can be put on individual fields.
I hate making a mess in gateways so finding an opportunity when the land is dry enough but grass isn’t growing isn’t always easy.
Thankfully slurry is easier thanks to the umbilicals ability to put it out with practically no wheelings in gateways in the spring along with light dressings between silage cuts.