Things have calmed considerably in the last two days, giving me a chance to get back into the office and take stock. It's been one of the busier periods we have had in a while.

During the last week we lifted about 300t of carrots, harvested and packed out 80 pallets of parsnips for a supermarket promotion, cropped around 100,000 bunches of cut flowers and seeded back our first block of earlies.

Seeding

The seeding was probably the most taxing as I needed to be in two places at the same time with packing ongoing. So as the only person that drives the seeder, I was under pressure. Added to this we took delivery of a new seeder (new to me anyway) which I had not only to calibrate and re-gear, but also to recalibrate my brain for the new setup.

You can manipulate a lot of things during the season but you only get one shot at getting the plant density right. Lots of phone calls and excel sheets ensued but I'm happy we got it right.

Spring cereals

Also on the agenda are some spring cereals which we will grow with a neighbour. We haven't been in the cereal game since 2010 when we refocused on root crops only. It was always my intention to get back on the horse when we expanded the root crop side of the house and I have an inkling that cereal prices will harden this year.

Globally, we have had three consecutive seasons of strong harvests in the key grain areas. This is not usual but time will tell the rest. The future for oilseed rape, however, looks pretty grim with beans the new kid on the block. It’s in today and gone tomorrow for poor old rape.

At home we hope to finish out our carrots in the next ten days in what has been our latest season ever. Parsnips and cut flowers should finish around the same time. It will be great to get the gear back to the yard having been gone since last August moving from field to field.

With machines spread around, I often wonder how much easier it would be if our cropping was all within 5 minutes of the farm. As it is we are spread from Waterford to Carlow and in between. You get used to it after a while but it certainly isn't ideal.