Early drilling and better ground suit Oxfordshire-grown milling wheats

Milling wheats, which accounted for about half his wheat area, were drilled relatively early or grown on better land and coped well with the autumn deluge. But later drilled or heavy land soft wheats were hit hard by the wet conditions.

“Some of the wheat did a lot better than we ever thought it could, but some was disappointing as expected,” says Adrian.

The first block of Skyfall milling wheat, about 45ha, was direct-drilled into a reasonable seedbed on 2 October, half after OSR and half after spring oats.

The remaining 33ha went in on 15 October after beans. “It was fairly easy ground but we didn’t achieve a nice seed bed at all. Some was cultivated and a bit was direct-drilled and we really felt we shouldn’t have been there,” he recalls. “It never looked that good all winter and I thought it was going to fail.

“We were also caught out by rust on the Skyfall early in the spring as it was so wet and the T0 went on late, so we had to be really vigilant after that.”

Despite this, the 33ha block was the surprise of the year. “I can only put it down to being on better ground – had it been on heavy clay I imagine it would have failed,” says Adrian.

It ended up yielding 10.15t/ha dried to 14% moisture, while the earlier drilled area still hit a very satisfactory 9.45t/ha.

A similar area of RGT Illustrious struggled. Although also sown in mid October, yields were around 2t/ha lower, averaging 8t/ha. “This was purely because it was on heavier ground in a wet season,” says Adrian.

“The ground suffered from wheelings, so we subsoiled, but I don’t think it did much. We then direct-drilled, which wasn’t the best decision, so the yield was certainly above expectations.”

Overall, the milling wheats averaged 300+ Hagberg, 11.9% protein and 82kg/hl specific weight. “The grain specification  was pretty consistent and didn’t vary much either way. We were growing on a 12.5% protein contract so it will go in with a fallback.”

The wheat was cut as soon as possible, starting at 21% though that soon came down. “We dried nearly everything,” says Adrian. “Taking an extra 2% of moisture out isn’t much of a bother if you are drying anyway, and if it means getting the milling premium, it’s worth it.”

Overall the milling wheats were much better than anticipated. “It almost sounds like I’m talking pub yields, but the results were purely down to earlier drilling on cleaner blackgrass land and avoiding the worst of the weather, so they were our top yields by a long way,” he explains.

“We did have our fair share of later-drilled wheats, about 50% of the wheat area, that really were hit by the conditions. I would say they averaged 6t/ha.”

Adrian has booked seed orders for next year. “We’ve been growing Skyfall for the 10 years since its launch. I like the variety – yellow rust can be a bit of a challenge, but it always seems to perform.

“We are also growing Illustrious again. We’ve been growing that nearly as long as Skyfall and it usually performs as well.”

RGT Blackmoon earmarked for September OSR sowing campaign

Adrian has ordered 25ha of RGT Blackmoon oilseed rape and is considering a further 15ha of the new variety for this autumn’s late sowing campaign.

“We don’t drill until September and I’ve been told it’s a variety that will suit that slot,” says Adrian, of Clattercote Priory Farm near Claydon. “We’ve been sowing later since we restarted growing OSR four years ago to try to miss the main flea beetle migration.

“We were hit hard by beetle larvae soon after the neonicotinoid ban and ended up taking a lot of crop out in May, so we gave OSR a miss for a couple of years.

“Delaying sowing has worked quite well for us. This harvest we had another OSR variety doing 3.5-3.75t/ha, though some did 2.5t/ha – it all looked fantastic in November, but stayed wet all winter.”

RGT Blackmoon will be drilled into a companion crop of buckwheat and berseem clover that was established towards the end of August.

“We’re giving companion cropping a go – we can claim under SFI for doing it and hopefully it will help hide the crop from flea beetles, so it’s a bit of a no-brainer. Choosing a variety like Blackmoon will hopefully make the system even more robust,” Adrian concludes.