Hedge Cutting

This time of year (January - March) is commonly known as the hungry gap for farmland birds and is a crucial period for many birds when food is at its scarcest as most of the natural supplies of food have been exhausted so we are regularly supplement feeding wheat screenings. This is the time of year when it is really possible to see the benefits of all of the different measures we take to provide food for the whole array of species we have on the farm. Our hedges are all managed to the rules set out in our environmental stewardship scheme and are either cut on a 2 or 3 year rotation. By cutting hedges at this time of year we are waiting until all of the berries have been eaten and this is evident by the condition of the birds we are catching whilst ringing. We have been finding that the Blackbirds (up to 140g) are carrying a lot of body fat and the Robins and Dunnocks are healthy weights (between 19g and 24g). It was a very good year for fruit in the hedgerows with Blackthorn, Hawthorn proving especially ‘fruitful’.  PJB 

A long and enjoyable season

A long and enjoyable season.

On Tuesday 1^st February the 2010/11 Shooting season finally comes to a close. The beautiful male Pheasants will soon be back strutting around without a care in the world as the spring buds start to emerge.

This season I have enjoyed some great days out in the countryside, ranging from a couple of mates and our dogs on the farm, to small family shoots, to larger commercially run days. I have met new people and reaffirmed old friendships, enjoyed the odd sloe gin and dished out plenty of banter but also received my fair share along the way. I really enjoyed all the days that I was generously invited on, so thank you to all for your kind invitations.

It has also been great to see lots of the younger generation learning about this vital country sport. Normally they spend the day in the beating line with stick or flag but good old dad (or occasionally mother) gives them a chance to bag a brace on the last drive. I started off in the beating line doing this and still remember my first brace of pheasants I ever shot, standing next to my dad at Shelland Wood with my Grandfather picking up behind me. I would have been ten or eleven and it is one of those Life Moments I will never forget. 

I have been brought up to appreciate the excitement and satisfaction that a quality high, fast, curling pheasant can bring as it folds up dead with your first barrel. On some really big 350+ bag commercial shoots you can’t remember any birds you shot as there have been so many but on the smaller days if you only shoot (or miss!!) one ‘cracker’ all day then it’s guaranteed you will remember it all season and beyond.

This year I have noticed a different mentality creeping into a number of shoots.  Where in the past it was all about numbers, this year it has started to swing back to quality and not quantity. At home, we run two days a year; we don’t release any birds so we are a totally wild bird shoot. We manage our shooting to maintain a healthy wild breeding stock of birds. We limit our guns to only shooting one or two female pheasants throughout the whole day and ask them to shoot more of the male pheasants. The males during breeding season become aggressive towards other males and hen pheasants.  They can fight to the death over territory and females!

We also have a total ban on shooting any Partridges and Woodcock on the farm but any flying vermin is fair game as long as it is safe. The Partridge ban is due to our work of conserving the population of Grey Partridges and Red legged Partridges on the farm through our Environmental Schemes. We have not shot a partridge on the farm for 10 years now and we have started seeing the benefits as we have a healthy population of wild Red legged Partridges and Grey Partridges. I say ‘wild’ as we do not have any farmers on our boundary at Westhorpe that release them for shooting so they have not wandered over from a neighbouring, organised shoot.

The Woodcock ban is something that we have brought in over our farm in the past 4-5 years. These birds are very common up north but rarer down here; many are migrants from Scandinavia but we do have a small resident population in the UK all year round. These beautiful small delicate brown birds, with their distinctive bobbing, jinking flight are great to watch and to admire. More and more shoots have started to ban Woodcock from being shot on their days, as many people have started to appreciate their importance and why they are actually on the RSPB Amber list for species in need of conservation. We just hope that they do not make it on to the RSPB Red list for species in critical decline, like many of our once common farmland birds. This year on our two days, we must have glimpsed between 35-40 Woodcock which was really pleasing to see.

I have also noticed the move away from pure Maize cover crops to more of a Wild seed mix as a cover crop, probably through the good work of Natural England’s Environmental Schemes and the Campaign for the Farmed Environment. These areas are used to concentrate the birds into shoot drives so they can be flushed from them. Maize is seen as the best cover crop but it gives very limited food source to wild birds, large and small. Shoots have started to use millet, mustard, cereals and other mixes to benefit all the birds on their land by giving small seed food throughout the winter. We must also not forget the importance of the shoots’ gamekeepers in maintaining the food in these areas by keeping their hoppers filled up and drinkers free of ice.  This is so that their reared birds can survive but also, so that the small wild birds like the Yellowhammers and Reed Buntings can keep fed as well. It has been a harsh winter and I have not enjoyed going out in the snow with my bags of feed on some days but now you see the flocks of small birds it does make it worth while.  While standing waiting for drives on our shoot, you notice all the Chaffinches, Green finch, Gold finch etc, flitting in and out of the cover crops where they are feeding.

Shoots also play a huge part in reducing the flying vermin that we see on a daily basis. Magpies, Jays and Crows all have huge impact on breeding birds in the spring. The use of Larson traps to control these species is a common practice over shoots, protecting all birds that are trying to nest. These birds are very clever and will know where all the nests in their range are. They will not take all the eggs at once but return day by day to have a week-long buffet. Last spring Dad successfully trapped over a 100 magpies and crows over our farm. If we did not do this and every one bred and had four to five young , the population would soon be out of control and our small birds would have to work even harder to rear a brood of young successfully.

A Larson trap is a legal trap used under the Wildlife and Conservation Act; it uses a trapped decoy bird in the cage to attract the very territorial bird into the trap which we then humanely and quickly dispatch. http://www.naturalengland.org.uk/Images/wml-gl06_tcm6-24151.pdf

Under the act, we have to keep the decoy bird fed, watered and shaded. Dry dog food is recommended by the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust instead of a dead rabbit or old egg as it keeps the living area clean of bacteria and maintains a much better balanced diet for the bird. We try and keep the traps out of sight but we have to, by law, check on it twice a day. It is a full time job especially when you have 4 or 5 to check on in different parts of the farm. We do see this as a necessary measure in conservation, so we do ask that if you find a trap, that you leave it well alone and do not release the decoy bird into another bird’s territory as it will usually be driven away or end up dead anyway, killed by the other bird holding the territory.

Shooting is a massive sport in the UK, bringing money to local businesses selling equipment, clothing or shooting services like clay pigeon shooting schools etc. It also supplies fresh food for pubs and restaurants, with shoot dinners also providing a welcome income for many rural pubs. It looks after our countryside with management of vermin that can quickly get out of hand - not just the flying vermin but the ground vermin as well like the foxes and grey squirrels. One shoot I was on this year, on the outskirts of Bury St Edmunds, said that they have shot over 400 foxes in 18 months and they have noticed a massive resurgence in wild game birds and song birds on the shoot. The number of foxes has not slowed down; however, showing the thriving population of urban foxes is now moving out to rural areas. The following article was in the daily Telegraph over Christmas.

 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/8235940/Giant-fox-caught-in-Maidstone.html

So, come Wednesday 2^nd, the season is closed and the planning for next year starts again. Hopefully this shooting and conservation vibe will continue into next season and on, as they do run so very well hand in hand. It also means that I will have to dust off the hockey stick, as I will have free Saturdays again.  At least I will lose my Christmas and Shooting season excess weight, ready for the Cricket season that starts in April!!!  BWB

  

        

Oxford Farming Conference 2011

Brian and I were very fortunate to attend the Oxford Farming Conference last week. We were sponsored by DHL to go as 'Scholars' and we owe an enormous debt of gratitude to James Hurrell from DHL and Andy Ormiston from FWAG for giving us the opportunity to attend the most high profile conference in British Agriculture. The whole conference was fascinating and a great insight into the direction in which farming is heading. There was presentation from high profile industry leaders and policy makers such as Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman, MEP George Lyon, Irish Agriculture Minister Brendan Smith and many other speakers on a wide variety of topics. The most interesting speaker was European Commissioner Dacian Ciolos who gave an insight into the direction that the agricultural subsidy system is heading. For farms like ours where environmental responsibility, biodiversity and resource protection are managed alongside maximising production the signs are very positive. The days of ploughing up every last bit of land are over and environmental responsibility will be rewarded in the new subsidy scheme.

We found the ‘out of conference’ time the most interesting and were able to meet and chat with many different people including agriculture minister Jim Paice MP and many other farmers, food producers, bankers, land agents and members of the press.

I have written a piece for our local paper the East Anglian Daily Times about the conference but for anyone who can not wait the article is below. PJB

Sky News - Young People 'Needed To Save UK Farming'

Oxford Farming Conference 3rd-6th Jan

Patrick and I are very grateful to Andy Ormiston of FWAG who has kindly arranged two sponsored tickets to this year’s Oxford Farming Conference. This event is the most prestigious farming conference in the calendar and we are very lucky to have been offered these tickets. We will listen to some very high profile speakers such as Rt Hon Caroline Spelman MP from the industry, over a range of topics such as Food security, Environmental Protection, Water Scarcity, a Forecast Population of 9bn- Realistic? Manageable? Sustainable? 

It will be a very long few days as the morning sessions start at 8.45am and we don’t finish until 7.30pm, so hopefully coffee will be on tap!! We will keep you informed about the industry chit chat from the conference on our return.                   BWB      

Goodbye to the last parts of the pig equipment

Just before Christmas, the last remnants of our pig enterprise were sold and removed. The feed milling and mixing plant had been left in the corner of the barn looking old and unused for nearly seven years. It has now been removed and installed at another farm just down the road and soon the mill will be grinding once again.

So why did we decide to stop our pig enterprise?

David had built it up from scratch throughout his career and it had been very successful; the years when wheat prices were down around £65/T made feed prices low and it was cost effective to fatten and sell on fattened pigs. However, in the last few years the age of our units was starting to show.  We employed 2 full time pig men with David and had to hand feed 60% of the pigs. Only the sow house was fed by automatic feeders using individual ID collars. It came to the point that we would have had to invest large amounts of capital into the buildings to make the enterprise more financially efficient. This coincided with the wheat market starting to climb in 2000 and Patrick and I starting to show interest in taking on responsibility for the daily running of the farm.

I had never had an interest in day to day livestock farming.  I understand the benefits that a livestock enterprise gives a farm (muck, outlet of some crops, straw usage etc) but I’m also aware of the dangers. We were very lucky not to be caught and seriously affected by the Foot and Mouth outbreaks or the later Swine Flu epidemics that followed. This was a warning of which we had to take note and our thoughts, conversations and ideas were starting happen more frequently, about what else we could invest our time in.

In the end, it was a very hard decision but a very easy decision!  For the past couple of years it had been a struggle and we were basically working 7 days a week for 4 day’s pay. This in any business would not be acceptable and so we looked at how much capital it would take to improve this. The capital investment would have been far too much and we would have never seen the pay-back. So the decision was made to cease production. This in my eyes was the right thing to do at the right time, the pig herd was slowly reduced and as the pigs were weaned and fattened, they left the farm. It was very difficult, especially on a professional level, as we had to make two loyal pig men redundant.

The last pig left the farm in 2004 and it freed up time and money. We hired all the pig building out as an empty unit to another pig farmer nearby for a year, while they totally rebuilt their own unit. They had a very similar unit to us but they decided to invest the capital that we did not want to.  The reason?  Their location added value to their pigs because they can sell them through a farm shop just off the A143. This was not a sensible option for us, as we do not have the location for a farm shop. We decided the buildings left had a market for lets and other new enterprises, so we started to invest our time and money into new ideas for the farm.

We cleared the walls of the pens out of all the sheds to open up more storage for hay, straw and machinery. The old weaning building was cleared and re clad and now is rented out to a local carpenter, the sow house with its isolated drainage area has become our fertiliser and new spray store (This will be explained soon in another post) and two small, low sheds have been left redundant until a suitable use can be found. 

This decision to stop pig production was a massive one for the farm but we have not looked back. I feel that the farm is growing higher yielding and higher quality crops than ever before, with much more accuracy. All our time is put into crop production, making sure that all the crop inputs are applied at the right time and the right rates to the right parts of the field. Machinery usage has been reduced by improving the quality of machinery that we have; machines have got bigger to reduce the number of passes, fuel and time in the field. This has all been done to improve our business.  However, the natural environment has not been forgotten in the drive for higher yields and quality. For every large or small decision made on a farming level, we consider the impact it has on the wider environment, so our farm ecosystem is thriving too.                 BWB

Crop Update

As Christmas lunch is around the corner seasonal vegetable producers are having a real hard time keeping up with demand. Carrots, parsnips, swede and other root vegetables are locked in the ground by our current soil conditions of permafrost.   They are starting to lift them now so hopefully we can all enjoy the honey glazed roasted carrots and parsnips with our turkey.

So what is this snow and permafrost doing to our crop on the farm? Our soil type is a heavy clay based structure that holds water and becomes waterlogged easily at this time of year. This is why my late Grandfather Eric decided that Sugar beet was not the best crop to grow on our soil. The last crop of Sugar beet was grown in 1968 a very wet year and the machinery could not move in the mud. In the end it was hand picked and loaded onto lorries by gypsies in return we paid them in fire wood! This opened up a slot in our crop rotation and we decided to start growing grass seed.

The grass seed crops in the ground currently have been grazed by the sheep, they have gone over all the crops grazing the plants down to their crowns so come the spring as it warms up the plants will send out new strong tillers. These will hopefully carry good amounts of seed and hopefully produce large amounts of good hay in the summer. The Sheep have now left the farm so that is one less thing to worry about over Christmas.

The winter wheat crop is up and looking strong, we started drill early so that the establishment was good. We have rolled and got 80% of the crop sprayed with our pre and post emergence herbicides to combat the black grass. This cold air is also doing us a favour to kill off any pests like aphids that transmit plant diseases such at Barley yellow dwarf virus (BYDV) and slugs that strip the young plants vegetation. Once the climate starts to warm up and the sun comes out the wheat will quickly move on and so will the weeds. We will catch up with the remaining herbicides and then nutrients will be applied to keep the plant health and green so that it can grow strong ready for the summer.

The Oil seed rape is just being hammered by the constant pressure of pigeons. Pigeons flock up at this time of year and once they have exhausted all other food such as acorns they descend on the oil seed rape crops in vast numbers. They eat the fresh leaves and they can ruin a crop, this is why it is important to get the crop up and established year in the year. We drilled our crops on the 18^th and 26^th of August and they have looked well ever since, however the pigeon damage in places is becoming a problem. To combat the pigeons we hang rope bangers that keep them moving. We do not use the anti-social gas bangers that echo around the countryside on a 20min cycle. Some times once the pigeons find a field it is very hard to move them on and so shooting them is the only way to really remove them. However pigeon shoot is an art, watching flight lines, positioning the hide correctly, setting out the decoys right with the wind, but it is a great days sport if you get it right! Pigeon shooters are always welcome if anyone does want a day shooting pigeons please get in touch ASAP!!  

The crops that are benefitting the most from this weather are the crops we have not drilled yet. This freezing and thawing is doing great things for the soil that is left on the plough. The land ready for the spring crops has been ploughed and had a deep cultivator pulled through it, this has created cracks in the clods which have filled up with water and as it freezes the ice expands the crack, as it thaws it retracts and the clay soil clods weaken and breaks down. This will make the seed bed come the spring very easy to prepare for the grass seed, spring oats and spring beans we are due to drill come April. Hopefully this will save us a pass with the crawler before drilling depending on how consolidated the seed bed is before drilling.

Well this is a little update on how the crops are fairing in this weather once spring comes we will keep you informed on what we are up to on the fields and around the farm. Have a Merry Christmas and look out for our next post soon. BWB