Hugh McDonnell

Bagenalstown, Co Carlow

It has been a busy few weeks for Hugh as he harvested his whole farm over the course of three weeks. The weather has been fantastic to get work done but he says that he thinks it has caused at least a 0.5t/ac reduction in yield across the board.

The winter oats were the first to be cut. They came in so quickly in the very hot weather that they caught Hugh out a bit, drying down when he thought they were not yet ripe. He says they were on really light land and the sun “roasted” them. The crop yielded 3t/ac at a moisture content of 10% to 11% and a KPH of 57. All the straw was chopped.

Hugh usually likes to cultivate the soil to mix in the straw as soon as possible after harvest, but with the very dry soils, he was not sure if it would make sense. However, he also does not like to leave the straw on top of the ground for a long time as it can dry out a lot which slows the decomposing process down.

Therefore, he did cultivate his stubbles despite the dry weather. He is happy that he did as the winter oat straw is already decomposing and “disappearing”, according to Hugh.

The winter oilseed rape was the next crop cut. It yielded 2t/ac at 9% to 10% moisture content. The stalks were very green and led to a very high fuel usage by the combine. It was using 27l/ha, much higher than it typically uses.

The winter wheat was cut in two blocks. The Champion wheat on light land was cut two weeks ago. It yielded 4t/ac, while the Graham wheat was cut last week on heavy land and yielded 3.6t/ac. The Graham wheat never got going all year, according to Hugh. This heavy land is where Hugh considered replanting back in March because the crop looked so bad. However, he is glad he did not now.

Patrick Daly

Ballinasloe, Co Galway

The harvest began on 9 July for Patrick with Integral winter barley yielding from 3.6 to 4.1t/ac. The moisture content was at 17% when he started to cut, but this quickly dropped to 15.5%. The hybrid barley surprised Patrick and yielded 4.2t/ac.

These two varieties ranged from 61 to 67.5 KPH.

By the time Patrick got to the two-row barley on 15 July, it had dried down very well and the hectolitre weight was very high.

He says that the straw was really good quality this year and it was baled up in great conditions; the moisture content was less than 9%.

Patrick says demand for straw has been quite high, especially with poor grass growth and buffer feeding making farmers think of their fodder reserves for the winter months.

The winter oilseed rape harvest began on 19 July and finished up five days later.

The first few fields that Patrick cut were very poor. They suffered from waterlogging over the winter and there was a lot of slug damage on the headlands.

It was also very wet around flowering in Patrick’s area, which, he thinks, did not help the crop either.

Despite this, the rest of the oilseed rape did a lot better, averaging 2t/ac with some spot yields reaching 2.6t/ac.

Patrick has not yet got into his winter wheat. He says the crop has come in fast but it will still be another couple of days by the time the grain is ripe. The straw is actually riper than the grain, which Patrick hopes is a good sign for the yield of the crop.

Once fields are cleared, Patrick is subsoiling the tramlines to break up compaction caused by travelling in the spring when the ground was very soft. He is also looking at getting slurry and digestate applied to the stubbles while the ground is dry to build up the organic matter of the soil.

Gary Gillespie

UCD Lyons Farm, Celbridge, Co Kildare

July has been a very dry month at UCD Lyons Farm, with only 3.5mm of rain falling in the entire month. The land is parched, with Lyons Hill taking on a burnt colour. Grass growth is minimal but the tillage crops seem to be holding up and are not showing a lot of drought stress so far.

The winter cereal and break crops were harvested over the past couple of weeks. As usual, it was a challenge to keep the crows away from the crops as they began to ripen. All crops were harvested at low moisture contents.

The winter oats had some lodging but with the dry weather, there were no issues at harvest. The winter rye stayed standing to harvest, despite its height.

The spring crops that are part of research experiments are not yet ripe and have retained their green colour very well considering the hot, dry weather except for the peas, which seem to be ripening in quickly.

Some pea varieties are lodging despite the low amounts of rain. BYDV symptoms are visible, especially in spring wheat.

Some intercropping plots were wholecropped last week. These samples are being taken to determine the dry matter yield of the different combinations and ratios of crops involved in the trial, which will hopefully help to determine the optimal combination of crops and the ratio of them to use with each other if they are being grown together for animal feed.

The remaining plots are being carried through to harvest to see how they perform from a yield and quality point-of-view.

The sunflowers are coming into flower. They are shorter than the last couple of years, as are many of the alternative crops.

This is being put down to the very hot weather and may actually be a positive for the crops that make it to harvest.