More rain: Many more areas of the country got rain in recent days and it will be generally welcomed. But the broken weather is coinciding with flowering in some crops which is less than ideal from an ear blight perspective. The heavy showers act as a lifeline for septoria and other wet season diseases.

It is likely that the lower temperatures over the past week will favour grain fill in winter barley, which still seems to benefit from slower growth during grain fill.

We must now hope that lodging will not be an issue in the better crops and that we do not get a new flush of late green tillers emerging.

Patches in crops that suffered premature senescence due the drought cannot recover. Many winter barley crops are already showing signs of turning. But then it is likely that winter barley harvesting will be well under way in a month’s time.

Crows: Crows are likely to attack winter barley shortly so take sensible precautions to keep them out of high-risk areas. Perhaps the risk will be significantly reduced now that rain is softening up grassland where there are obviously a lot of leatherjackets and other grubs this year. However, it still makes sense to try and prevent initial attack along crop edges, beside wire fences, under over-hanging wires, around lodged patches, etc.

Kites, balloons, humming tape, scarecrows, etc might be used in these areas. If possible, refrain from using bangers until an attack has occurred. In real high-risk situations you might consider setting up an electrical fence device to scare them using electric shock, as explained in an article in the Irish Farmers Journal of June 2017.

This is a humane way of keeping them away. If there is not an adjacent electric fence post to mount it on, drive down a tall post in the field, set the device on top and use a battery-powered fence. Feeding crows use a lookout bird on a high perch and if you can ‘shock’ it into leaving, the others will quickly follow.

Final fungicides: Most winter wheat crops are now likely to have received their final fungicide, thanks to the speed of recent development and the recent good spraying conditions. Most spring barley crops have also been sprayed but there may be a few later crops still to receive their final fungicide. It is critical that final sprays include cover for rust and ramularia, as well as rhyncho and net blotch. Apply this fungicide as the awns are emerging.

Include a contact such as Phoenix for ramularia control with products like Siltra, Ceriax, Bontima, Elatus Era, Fandango, Revystar or other mixtures.

Final sprays on oats at heads out could be something like Elatus Era, Cielex or Folicur plus Jenton. Final sprays on spring wheat will be a triazole mix such as Prosaro, Gleam or Magnello, plus or minus a strobilurin or a morpholine. History had shown benefit from chlorothalonil inclusion but, as this is no longer allowed, the inclusion of Folpet could be advantageous.