Family farm’s flexibility crucial in turbulent times – Farmers Guardian
An open mind and the habit of questioning everything are key for anyone considering carbon – and their farm costs – says Shropshire farmer Harry Heath ...
It can often be tempting, once you have done something for a while, to think you have got to grips with it and to settle into a routine and habit.
But for Shropshire grower and contractor Harry Heath, changing and adapting his farming practices has become the norm. Asking ‘why’ and keeping an open mind have been the keys to changing the family farming business to one which has put soil health, the environment, resilience and profitability at its heart.
And it is an approach that he thinks is even more crucial now as farming faces such turbulent times. It has meant some tricky decisions – including getting out of intensive pig production this spring after 53 years and dropping potatoes and sugar beet crops.
The maths made it an inevitable decision to give up indoor pigs, which would have been further impacted by rocketing energy costs. And while markets evolve and change, he says it can be very easy to fall into a trap of continuing to do something because you have always done it.
Root crops were dropped a few years ago, once the family started to become worried about their soils.
Trendy
“Regen has become trendy over the last four to five years, but it was before this that we started to see our soil structure and health deteriorating and we decided the way we were farming was not helping.
“While we grew potatoes and sugar beet for the right reasons – they were profitable – we had to look at the long-term sustainability of the business. There were a couple of light bulb moments too when we had intense rain and had a lot of run-off and erosion. Soil is so much more than just a medium to grow plants.”
Now, the farm at Whitley Manor comprises 200 hectares of owned land, with a further 400ha of contracting – something which will increase next year. There is no fixed rotation, crops are direct drilled only when conditions are right, and there is a much greater focus on thinking about what the right thing is to do in the conditions, rather than farming by the calendar and fixed ideas or plans.
Being proactive and reactive means Mr Heath is continually learning. “At times, we have gone too far the other way and have ended up with unintended con-sequences. Drilling oilseed rape too early had a knock-on effect with our grass-weed problem, for instance.”
The key to farming in this way is always to ask ‘why’, he says. This extends to the discussions he has with his agronomist, Ed Brown from Hutchinsons, who is the firm’s head of agroecology.
“I am probably not a very easy client, but we don’t have recommendations which just land on the desk – we have got to justify everything we do. But Ed is also very good at asking ‘why’, and we are good at challenging one another.”
That approach and desire to learn has led to Whitley Manor becoming one of Hutchinsons’ Helix Farms, specialising in agroecology.
It means Mr Heath is involved in a number of on-farm trials which have soil health and the environment as their focus.
Mapped
The farm has been mapped using Hutchinsons TerraMap high-definition soil mapping, a process which has given him a huge amount of data, including carbon, organic matter, nutrients and soil texture profiles with up to 800 reference points per hectare and 28 map layers.
“Finding time to really dig into all of this data is a challenge, but I am going to spend time with the specialists from Hutchinsons and Ed looking at this and how we can enhance value.” Changing the farm’s soils will take time, he says, and he is aware that it can be like snakes and ladders – progress can be quick but can fall quickly too.
He believes a stepped transition to direct drilling – with min-till as a halfway house – is a good option for anyone considering making the change. “It is easy to go cold turkey and make the change too quickly, which adds risk. “The really good thing about direct drilling is that it does separate cultivation and drilling.
We had a power harrow and combination drill and bought a direct drill, but if I did it again, I would go for min-till first – we did do some cultivation before direct drilling though.”
A trial looking at direct drilling without the use of glyphosate is one of the farm’s most prominent trials, located just on the side of the farm drive. “We are weighing up light cultivation versus glyphosate and so far we have seen no detrimental effect from just using cultivation.
We do need to be able to keep glyphosate, but if we can use it wisely and less, I would hope we can continue to use it.” Herbicide resistant ryegrass is another challenging area on-farm; it needs active management, resulting in Mr Heath changing cropping in affected fields.
Two years ago, ryegrass out-competed oilseed rape, so the field was sprayed off and spring barley direct drilled into it, but it was also over-run with ryegrass. “Then I decided to hit the reset button and plough – I will use the plough when I have to, as every hectare has to be productive.
We then put it into sunflowers for birdseed which was a success – but dealing with the ryegrass and multiple crops was a painful learning process. However, we are growing four times the acreage of sunflowers this year, so sometimes opportunity will present itself.”
Besides sunflowers, the farm grows several winter crops – barley, wheat, oilseed rape and beans, as well as spring beans and some bicrops such as boats (spring beans and oats), which help reduce overall nitrogen requirement.
End Use
“Bicropping is a lovely idea but it does require some thought about the end use and harvesting something with similar sized seeds can be a challenge.”
Crop nutrition is another focus area, and increasingly so with the ‘ballistic’ price of nitrogen. So far, N rates have been reduced by about 20%, but with a cautious view as Mr Heath says he needs to be confident the soil is cycling nutrition.
“We are doing tramline trials to determine our own farm N response rate, given we have a long history of applying organic manures, and using some biologicals to see how they perform.
“We are also using sap testing, and I see a lot of value in it as you can put your finger on the pulse of what is happening right now in a crop. However, the problems with accessing the service this season and delayed results made them almost obsolete. We used an N meter too, but we thought sap testing was the gold standard.”
All of the work and trials at Whitley Manor are aimed at keeping the farming business moving in the right direction, with flexibility adding resilience to farm performance and profitability.
But it is also proving to be an interesting and absorbing way to farm for Mr Heath. “Even a few trials a year are a hook to go in a different direction, and I think it’s important to be willing to learn. We are really just at the start of our journey and we have ambition to do better.”
Next Steps
For growers who have already made changes to their system, future developments are around nuance, says Hutchinsons service leader Matt Ward.
“Omnia will help with measuring and accurately identifying where things could be improved, such as potentially managing lower yielding areas differently. It is about recognising where you are efficient and where you need to become more efficient, especially after you have the early wins.
“There is no fixed agenda with farming like this. It is not about throwing away technique, it is about the most appropriate choice and about ensuring productivity to reduce carbon per tonne.”
He cites the Helix national site as a case in point. The area with the highest carbon footprint per hectare – due to an additional cultivation pass to reduce compaction – gave the highest yield. This meant it actually had a good carbon/tonne figure due to the additional productivity.
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