Archived News

14th June 2016

The cross bred cattle have moved out of barns to new pasture and the vacated barns have been mucked out with the  farm yard manure being taken out to fields where it is left in heaps until required by the next crop.  This is also best practice during the closed period in a Nitrogen Vulnerable Zone (NVZ) in which we farm. Unfortunately the storage of organic manures in this manner for many months of the year means that methane, a powerful greenhouse gas is emitted to the atmosphere, something we could prevent with an anaerobic digestion s(AD) system to capture the greenhouse gases.

Farmers are tasked amongst other things, with cutting carbon emissions, improving soil, providing more land for wildlife whilst increasing yields on less land than before.   We are keen to farm in the best way possible to achieve these objectives as have previous generations through research and technology across the farming spectrum.

Anaerobic digestion has been around for a long time, with an AD system built in a Leper colony in India in 1859 and biogas recovered from a sewage treatment works to fuel street lamps in Exeter in 1895.

AD systems have captured biogas from sewage in the UK for over 100 years and the system has been used in agriculture for decades.    There are over 6 million anaerobic digesters  on farms in china, thousands in Germany, Austria and other European countries and over 142 agricultural AD systems using cutting edge technology in the UK resulting in substantial benefits to the environment, improving farming efficiency, biosecurity, soil improvements and carbon reduction, enabling use of organic farm produced fertiliser instead of importing arteficial fossil-based fertilisers and helping local areas lead the way in meeting local and national targets on reducing carbon emissions. 

Twenty six finished cattle left the farm this week for the abattoir and we won't know the price until after the carcasses have been graded.  Abattoirs have devised a new grading scheme which skews in their favour and penalises the farmer with new criteria resulting in an average price  much lower than last year.

A contractor has just completed ten acres of haylage making and wrapping in Hatch Meadow and behind the church, with another 40 - 50 acres to be cut and wrapped when the weather remains dry.

The 73 bales will be stored until they're needed to feed livestock during winter.

We have 200 acres of winter barley growing on the heavier ground which has been knocked down by wind in places. 

We are growing Crusoe and Skyfall varieties of wheat this year on fields that grew oilseed rape last year. Two varieties are grown in order to spread risk of one variety failing for any reason such as being wiped out by a pest or disease.

There are a variety of margins, shaws and hedgerows around the farm which provide wildlife habitat, food sources and corridors linking different wildlife areas.

The fields with recently cultivated or sown areas surrounding an already established crop are being managed for wildlife. 

The field in the picture above has recently been sown with wheat which will grow up around the field, surrounding an established crop.  This later drilled wheat will be left to provide feed for overwintering birds.

Some margins have the soil cultivated or broken up but don't have anything sown because these areas are managed for the high level of rare weeds that have been identified there.  

The grass headlands provide many species of grass and wild flowers which are alive with buzzing insects and create a riot of colour.

Cattle graze the North Downs generally between April and September to manage the herb - rich chalk downland which has a very thin top soil supporting a fantastic array of flora and fauna including the Bee Orchid below.

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