Data-driven decisions inform rotation plans – Arable Farming

“Input price sensitivity analysis indicates the resilience of a crop and rotation choice, so the potential impact of changes can be measured and risks assessed.

“And if only certain areas of the field should make money, then field splits can be considered for stewardship schemes on the low-performing areas.”

It is also possible, by inputting the relevant operating costs, to assess what a change in practices such as a different cultivations strategy or a move to direct drilling may do, says Mr Foyle – and to calculate the carbon costs/savings of a rotational change.

“Of Omnia’s three subscription levels, more than half of our users subscribe to the top Business Manager level, which includes the rotational planning tool.

“Farmers often start to look at stewardship schemes, crop choice and rotations in times of uncertainty and market volatility in both inputs and outputs.

“But stewardship may work better for some farms, rotations or fields than others.

“Identifying worst-performing land to potentially remove it from production is relatively easy, but identifying where stewardship is a profitable alternative in the rotation as a whole is more challenging. That is where Omnia’s calculating and comparison power helps.”

Andrew Mason manages 348 hectares of Grade 3 land for Tom Ramsden at the all-arable Low Lindrick Farm ,near Ripon, North Yorkshire.

Being in a mixed farm area means he has opportunities including muck for straw swaps with local livestock producers, and incorporating maize and grass into his rotation.

However, with significant changes in areas from input prices and output costs to farm support, David Stead, his Hutchinsons agronomist, and Hutchinsons’ Will Foyle have helped Mr Mason assess the merits of broadening the farm’s rotation further.

“Andrew and Tom are enhancing their commitment to building soil health and resilience, examining the whole picture of cropping, rotation, soil health and sustainability and moving from a deep loosening and cultivator drill system to a low-disturbance subsoiler and a direct drill,” explains Mr Stead.

“This has been aided by TerraMapping to support soil analysis, variable nitrogen application, and use over the past five years of Omnia’s Business Manager package to analyse data including combine yield mapping and provide cost/ha field maps.

“The rotational tool was subsequently added to assess the potential benefits of rotation-tweaking to match the new crop establishment strategy, soil health focus and changes in farm support.

“While the farm has previously used stewardship for better returns on awkward field corners, its HLS agreement was nearing its end, and Andrew and Tom were considering deeper commitments to a new Higher Tier five-year scheme and revised rotation.

“Ahead of autumn 2022, when they planned to move from minimal cultivations to direct drilling, they asked if Will and I would advise, and we suggested using the Omnia rotational planning tool to assess how these changes might work.”

One of the options under the current version of Countryside Stewardship is GS4, requiring, in return for a £382/ha payment, establishment of a legume and herb-rich sward, but with an allowance for cutting/grazing.

“On the surface, this appealed and the initial thinking was for three years of GS4 in an eight-year rotation, helping build soil organic matter, providing a combinable crop break that would aid weed control and a potential source of grazing for local sheep,” says Mr Stead.

“But questions included how this would fit financially within other crops in the rotation, and whether the time period was right.

“We started by assessing the current situation, and looking at where GS4 would fit as a break crop, focusing on the lower yielding wheat fields.

“The question was how much and how long to commit to GS4, weighing up the returns and the limited cost after establishment, plus other benefits including grass-weed control, against a quicker path back to a first wheat.”

The initial preference for a three-year GS4 commitment was due to the appeal of spreading the costs of establishment over the longer period.

“At current commodity and input prices, though, there is not a lot of difference in business benefit between committing to two or three years of GS4. Sensitivity analysis we conducted around rising input prices, showed a clear threshold where the amount of GS4 commitment meant the wheat area was too small to be profitable.

“In a scenario of sustained good wheat prices and average input costs, returning to wheat one year sooner was more profitable. This was compounded by issues we have with frit fly after grass, which would require a post-GS4 bean break crop – delaying wheat cropping by another year.

“The rotation tool therefore showed us that a two-year GS4 commitment, as part of an extended rotation, was likely to be sufficient to benefit soil health and manage risk, while ensuring that the farm’s wheat area always remains of a viable size for profitability.”

The farm had been under an all-winter rotation of oilseed rape, wheat, oats, barley and oilseed rape, with grass and maize also grown on some ground for local cattle farmers, explains Mr Mason.

He and farm owner Mr Ramsden were keen to incorporate GS4 for reasons including further rotational diversity, nitrogen fixation and weed suppression.

“We also wanted to add a further cropping option, to introduce a gap between grass and wheat to avoid that potential frit fly problem, and further aid soil health and weed control.

“Beans were the favoured option, but we did not want to make changes and find profitability falling down the line as a result, so agreed with Willand David that we would use the Omnia rotational planning tool to calculate what business effect different options would have.

“The aim was to plan proactively as well as financially, to minimise risk with a system that will offset some of the unknowns we cannot control, such as price variations and weather issues.

“Using Omnia we were able to test a handful of possible options and narrow them down, evaluating the selected plan under different scenarios of changes in crop and input prices to stress-test it thoroughly.

“A key driver was our desire to further reduce our cultivations.

“Previously we loosened ground with a Sumo Trio with low-disturbance points, with drilling then carried out by a contractor using a Vaderstad Rapid. To improve timeliness and reduce costs, for autumn 2022 we subsequently purchased a 4m Horsch Avatar direct drill, and a Grange low-disturbance subsoiler for loosening only where necessary.

“With this came a reduction in power requirement, with a 310hp John Deere 7310R swapped for a 185hp 6185R, meaning we factored in lower machinery costs for fuel, servicing and depreciation, plus less compaction from the lighter tractor. Drilling fuel use should now average 5.0 litres/ha.”

Both winter beans and the GS4 legume stewardship option stacked up favourably in the rotational planning calculations, with respective forecast margins of £614/ha and £485/ha, the latter taking into account GS4’s grazing/forage value.

As a result, beans were introduced on one 20ha block planted direct with the new drill in autumn 2022.

“The GS4 mix will be introduced in 2023-24 if the farm’s stewardship application is successful, as part of a new nine-year rotation that will comprise two years down to a GS4 mix, followed by winter beans, wheat, oats, wheat, barley, oilseed rape and wheat.

“We focus on winter crops, preferring to avoid spring types as we are often already still cutting wheat in September, and now will also be doing beans.

“The GS4 mix can be cut or grazed before weed grasses shed seed, and we can follow it with winter beans.

“The Omnia rotation planning tool gives us the flexibility to trial changes on-screen and see the likely results before committing.

“It has opened my eyes to the power of joined-up advice – within an hour we had made solid progress on our future direction with objectives we could test from every angle for resilience,” Mr Mason says.