Winter wheat yields

Adeptandy

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
PE15
Is this a "My disaster is worse than yours" post. Like the opposite of a pub yields survey. God you lot are depressing.
If you lot are to be believed the cereal harvest will be no more than 5m tonne.
Maybe some of us are just brutally honest rather than painting a pretty picture ?
My moto is if your going to share the good, you should also show your failings ?
 

texelburger

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Herefordshire
We,on the home Farm, are down 50% of wheat area sown.It looks ok'ish but not very thick and a few bare patches.So I predict we will yield around 70% of our tons/acre on an area down 50 %.Do the sums.On another two farms,one has its normal wheat acreage which, again I predict about 70 % of normal yield.The last farm which is lovely alluvial silt river ground has had about 10 proper floods on it.40 % of the wheat was ripped up and re drilled with spring wheat and looking at the rest makes me think it should all have been re drilled. I estimate 30 to 40 % of normal yield. Think the trade will have a shock at harvest time.
Just to compound our misery we have just started loading wheat out of the grain store and there has been a flood in the one side where an inch or so on the floor,underneath the pile is black and mouldy.
Oh the joys of farming ! Looking on the bright side,though,we finished lambing today.A texel ewe has had an immaculate conception and produced a lovely tup lamb.I think I know the sire !
Why did I buy that extra ground last autumn ? Answers on a postcard please.
 

DRC

Member
Maybe some of us are just brutally honest rather than painting a pretty picture ?
My moto is if your going to share the good, you should also show your failings ?
Yes, I did post the disastrous field of barley after potatoes that had to be re drilled, oh and my rubbish looking Gleam on heavy land. Although that has pulled around in the main, just nothing on some headlands
 

Shutesy

Moderator
Arable Farmer
not good, it seems that min/low till systems have been unreliable both in the wet autumn and the dry spring? plough still king?
Nope definitely not still king! On our 470 acres we haven't ploughed anything this year (or last for that matter) and we have some pretty good crops of W Wheat and all the spring crops are looking very well though will need another drink soon, all either drilled into lightly disced land or direct in with the strip till drill.
One neighbour on a similar acreage ploughs everything, only got 60 acres of wheat in last autumn, 100 acres has been left fallow half ploughed as they couldnt get it all ploughed and drilled in the spring, the rest is drilled with spring cereals and at best 60-70% good emergence in patches across most fields, one field I saw has only germinated where the tractor wheels have run when drilling and then rolling, looks a right mess. Its more about the management not the machines sometimes. Another neighbour runs a deeper min-till system and his crops look well.
 
Wheats look ok, desperate for rain though. Could go either way from here
E6281948-1A08-464E-AD57-83BA026BC207.jpeg

Can fit my hand in up to the wrist down that.
 

snarling bee

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Bedfordshire
I predict my wheat yields will be down 10-15% on last year. Too many holes in the clay patches and the healthy plants just won’t fill them in. 64mm rain in the last 4 weeks but I will need that every month until harvest of they will burn off on the gravels.
Some of have whole fields of your clay patch, but I suppose that makes it easier to manage.
Our Clays look better than the odd light patch or the chalk.
 

teslacoils

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lincolnshire
not good, it seems that min/low till systems have been unreliable both in the wet autumn and the dry spring? plough still king?

Not really. Seedbeds were excellent into the non ploughed. This was 4th April. Strong crop of volunteer barley. Was in the low 20s while drilling. I thought it looked cock-on. Rolled tight behind. More often than not it autumn ploughing that's the spring pudding. Nowts growing. Been up on the cliff and there's plenty of spring cereal that looks crap there too.


Plough is still best. But you have to enjoy getting 1.2ac an hour from your 4f, 180hp rig. And you still need the weather. We cut 9t barley crops and 12t wheat crops last year with 300mm of useful rain in the year. We had 650mm in our peak drilling window. Never known a year with no drilling days in October, November, December, jam or feb. They were lifting potatoes and planting on the same day ten days ago (different fields).
 

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robbie

Member
BASIS
Wheat here is full of potential. Two inches between now and the end of the month will see it yield well.
S barley the sameView attachment 876808

Same here. Wheat looks as good as any year, spring barley is coming along nicely.
The only downer at the minute is the winter barley which,although its perked up a lot since the last rain. I feel irreparable damage to yield has been done.

But and it's big but regular rain is going to be crucial if not itll all go down the pan very quickly.
20200507_201315.jpg

Spring barley lastnight
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The East Midlands is the second biggest wheat producing area in a normal year due to the large area cropped
could be one of the lowest this harvest
we usually produce more than the consumers in the area use
some Can be replaced with the spring barley but we will still need to import grain into the area
 

Donkey Oaty

Member
Location
Aberdeenshire
The market has come off it's peak. I still have some 2019 harvest to sell. Ideally, I'd like it out of the store but could keep it. At what point in the year do worldwide wheat yields become known rather than conjecture? UK harvest is obviously one of the later ones.
 

4course

Member
Location
north yorks
our wheats look ok not world beaters but not disasters other than 1 feb sown that is struggling,problem is we only have a % sown and the rest has been spring sown into a drought,reckon cereal sales here at best will be down 25% against our average t/ac and having walked some wheat tonight and split the stem to investigate the grain sites in the ears that -25% is looking optimistic
 

PSQ

Member
Arable Farmer
Russian drought hit the market end of July or August a few years ago

The Russian authorities have imposed restrictions on exports for this quarter due to ‘domestic supply issues’ around Covid19. They’re expected to reach their quota (7.5mmt rings a bell) around the 15th of May (next Friday), and grain movements have slowed up due to the expected shutdown. This will be factored into world prices already, but it will certainly add to price volatility, which is nice.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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