Blankney Farm Update – 17 November 2023

This Autumn has been extremely wet with October bringing a total of 216mm of rain – with over 110mm in one day with Storm Babet.

You might say, at that point, that the tide came in (!), this has left us with less Winter Wheat (-10%) and more Spring Cropping as  a result of the wet conditions, however we have lifted a higher proportion of our sugar beet crop – on our heath soils which are more forgiving and as a result of this we have been able to establish more of our winter wheat to compensate.

Some of our heavy land crops have been waterlogged and are struggling. In reality, we won’t be able to make a decision about their viability until we get into the spring.

Maize harvest was completed with 87% of the crop taken as forage, with yields at 43t/ha overall, this is a good result. The remaining area will be combined next week with the expectation of 1,000t of grain maize going into store.

Sugar Beet harvest is now 30% complete and is averaging 8% above our 5 year average.