Zurn Top Cut collect
- Thread starter CPF
- Start date
- Location
- Top of the Chilterns
Yes.
Got contractor in to do some last yr.
Did wild oats in linseed. Very effective. Needed a man on a loader to keep him empty though.
Wild oats in spring barley. Not quite so good a job, as less of a height differential, but still worth it.
Timing is key. Obviously before whatever the weed is sheds its seed, but late enough so that it doesn't have time to tiller again etc. Blackgrass, particularly about now, would be a waste of time in my view, as it'll only put on twice the tillers rapido.
It's chuffing expensive.
It looks like a wobby praying mantis when unfolding.
I don't think it has a steering axle.
Got contractor in to do some last yr.
Did wild oats in linseed. Very effective. Needed a man on a loader to keep him empty though.
Wild oats in spring barley. Not quite so good a job, as less of a height differential, but still worth it.
Timing is key. Obviously before whatever the weed is sheds its seed, but late enough so that it doesn't have time to tiller again etc. Blackgrass, particularly about now, would be a waste of time in my view, as it'll only put on twice the tillers rapido.
It's chuffing expensive.
It looks like a wobby praying mantis when unfolding.
I don't think it has a steering axle.
JonL
Member
- Location
- East Yorks
Looks like a bloody expensive way of not doing enough to get on top of the problem
No one has got on top of problem, looking around at all the black grass about this year .
I’am looking at the machine so it doesn’t come a bloody expensive way to Control weeds ( black grass).
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Thank you
Will you be using one this year?
Have you got less weeds this year?
The company selling them, not too far from you .
- Location
- Top of the Chilterns
Have a bit of charlock in some organic wheat that I might get him to do if he's passing.Thank you
Will you be using one this year?
Have you got less weeds this year?
The company selling them, not too far from you .
Other than that I've only got plenty bg in conventional wheat (miles more than normal), which I reckon is not worth doing, for thr reasons above. Have no spring crops as weather not conducive, so no linseed etc.
Wild oat seed return from where we used it last yr certainly seems less than would otherwise have been the case.
- Location
- Top of the Chilterns
Contractor invests in Zurn Top Cut Collect blackgrass harvester - Farmers Weekly
A small but growing army of combinable crop growers are resorting to medieval methods in their war on weeds, shunning modern chemical weapons in favour of
www.fwi.co.uk
I will be following this with interest - I've booked Kevin Smith to come & do at least half my wheat area that is stuffed with blackgrass. Some fields are unfit for combinable crops in places.
The Top Cutter is just a symptom of a system that needs major change, but anything that has the potential to reduce seed return by 50%+ is worth a look IMO.
The Top Cutter is just a symptom of a system that needs major change, but anything that has the potential to reduce seed return by 50%+ is worth a look IMO.
Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
Please keep us posted on here too - be interesting to see photos, have your thoughts and what you decide to do afterwards in terms of "major change".
Will do. Some fields are about to go into AB15 & I've terminated some spring pulses where the BG plants outnumbered the crop plants, but that's not enough. The strip till drill moves too much soil at the point of drilling which last year broke the dormancy of most of it, only for pre ems to go on in the dry then wet weather delayed follow up post em sprays.
Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
Thank you.
Sounds similar to what we faced here last year. Was thinking today when spraying some grassy fields and wondering what I could have done differently that every positive action against blackgrass also has an opposite negative reaction.
For example:
Early drilling for a more competitive wheat crop (good) increases blackgrass too so more plants germinate and are bigger sooner (bad).
Late drilling means less blackgrass (good), but risks poorer wheat plants too and also that Atlantis risks not getting applied before Christmas (bad).
The only thing that I thought of that wasn't detrimental was increased seed rates - if blackgrass populations are high, sowing more wheat seeds makes total sense to counter the increased number of blackgrass seeds.
All tools in the toolbox, but a system change isn't just encouraging crop competition & altering drilling dates by a few weeks! Longer rotations with grass ley breaks of 3 years+, lower soil disturbance, rotational ploughing, spring cropping and zero tolerance to letting a population go to seed are some of the more drastic methods.
alomy75
Member
In theory it’s a good idea. In reality you’d have to go so steady to keep fine tuning the settings it would be exhausting to do any sort of job. They’re well north of 100k aren’t they? If my bg was that bad and I had to crop it I’d consider a contractor to have a go but I certainly wouldn’t buy one. It’s a fire engine but the real gains are to not start the fire in the first place. Easy to say I know but there are some clean crops around; not many but some are getting it right.
Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
Couldn’t agree more. The only way to tackle it is to go fully throttle at it and hit it from every direction possible.
- Location
- North Norfolk
