Summerhill Farm News from Rob Brighton

The harvest was very much a mixed bag. The Maris Widgeon wheat had a tremendous growth of straw but the grains were shrivelled due to moisture stress. The yield of 1 tonne to the acre was disappointing whereas the winter oats surpassed all expectations coming in with a record yield of 2.5 tonnes/acre. The straw was excellent with a feed value more usually associated with medium quality hay.

The increased size of the beef herd gave the opportunity to undertake some necessary culling to remove some of the substandard cows. The calves are conformation graded on a scale of 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent) and this gives an indication of those animals not capable of producing offspring of the desired quality. The next area to tackle will be isolating the genes for tender/succulent carcasses.This will be vital to the development of direct sales and adding value to the beef enterprise.

One great advantage of last year's dry summer was the ability to take the subsoiler (paraplow) around the farm. This will pay dividends to the growing crops as the increased availability of air in the root zone energises the release of plant nutrients. The latest soil analysis shows that the pH of the rotatable fields are all at 6.5-6.7 and yet the phosphate and ptash levels are low. The heavy clay soil at Summerhill has an abundance of these major nutrients. It is a question of availability - hence the vital role that subsoiling plays.