A Successful Day, Dispite The Weather

Our first visitor for this years Open Farm Sunday event arrived in the drizzle just before 9am.  The tractors were polished, the trailers swept and the fields nicely mown.  After a slightly delayed start we headed off to The Overbury Stud where Simon Sweeting gave us a talk about the workings of a stud farm.  It was fascinating hearing about scanning mares to check for a pregnancy at 16 days.  We also saw a Brown Hare running across one of the fields, a great start to the trip.

Following on from Simon we had a talk from Dominc Swainson about the sprayer that we use to apply the pesticides and fertiliser to the fields.  We spoke about Integrated Farm Management and gave some exampled of how we use the philosophy at Overbury Farms to help with our decision making processes.  We learnt about the annual requirement to have an MOT type certificate through NSTS for each sprayer and the fact that the sprayer operators all had to be trained through NRoSO We also spoke about the amount of planning we need to complete before fertiliser is applied to each individual field and the records that are kept of each application.  This also contributed toward the farms accreditation to LEAF Marque of which we are very proud.

Our next station was to hear all about Bumble Bees and how they can help us with pollination of our crops.  Stuart Veall works for Syngenta and he came out with a small hive of bees which everyone found amazing.  It is hoped that another year we can have a couple of hives to help with our crop and margin pollination.  We parked next to a beetle bank with pollen and nectar strips adjacent to each other and explained further about the farms conservation plans and how we are increasing food and habitat for farmland birds, including Corn Buntings and Tree Sparrows.

William Fox (Frontier Agriculture) was on hand to complete the story about what happens to our crops when they leave the farm.  He told us about biofuels created from wheat and rape, Carling Beer made from our malting barley and even how beans are used in fish food as a protein source.  Apparently when crushed the beans are sticky and can hold minerals and other constituents of a ration together in the water for feeding to fish.  (Even Farmer Jake learnt something as well!).  After the last stop we came back down from the hill and thawed out a little before unloading a repeating the process again. 

We had such a lot of help on the day from Derek, Gordon, Graham and Tim for driving the tractors and getting the farm machinery in place; Tod, James and Harry, who looked after the livestock (sheep, chickens and a duck) and from Suzie and Kieren for setting up the gazebo and organising the lists and putting the packs together on the day.  Obviously a huge thanks to our speakers on the day and to those that braved the weather to show up and listen to what I believe makes British food the safest in the world, being produced sympathetically to our environment, by the best farmers in the world.

Farmers Toast Carling Western Growers Group

Yesterday I travelled up with James Cox, (2010 Malting Barley grower of the Year) to Burton-on-Trent to the annual meeting of the Carling Western Growers Group (CWGG).   The group of over 70 farmers supplies about 20,000t of malting barley every year to Molson Coors The barley is used to provide malt for Carling Beer and we feature heavily as a group in their 100% British Barley campaign of which we are very proud to be associated. 

One of the benefits to being part of this club is the knowledge that our produce, which we spend hours planning for, growing, harvesting and storing are going to a  known home and one as popular as Carling.  There are other benefits as well; being able to share knowledge about growing the crop more efficiently and therefore reducing the carbon footprint (also through the whole supply chain), preferential harvest treatment and having a direct link with the maltster and discussing, one to one, the intricate points of malting barley.  The session concluded with a forward look at the corporate responsibilities and the contract for the next 3 (or so) years of barley supply.  Everyone left with a positive feel about the group and what it can provide our customer with going forward, and it wasn't caused by the complimentary C2 Beer

Coors 'Best Practice' for storage

The malting trade is a very difficult business as we are dealing with a living growing seed. The seeds or grains must therefore be kept in perfect conditions to avoid loosing germination or getting pest infestations. Keeping those two key thoughts in the forefront of our minds was the key message from James, who's farm we visited last night. Drying the grain and then slowing cooling the crop was the best way to avoid any costly rejections at the malthouses in Burton on Trent.

Trying to get the crop dried to a target of 14% moisture and then cooled down to about 10 degrees should see the crop safely into long term storage, from harvest 2010 until the summer of 2011.

Next week a group of growers are heading to Denmark to see what we can learn from the Danish growers and maltsters about getting the right product to the right customer at the right price. I'll keep you posted as to how we get on!

Harvest Update

We've had a fairly good spell of weather for the past 10 days and been able to make good progress, we even managed to harvest some of the spring barley without having dry it. The Solstice wheat is all but in the barn, 14ha's left, at 500ft, that is not fit yet. We should finish the malting barley on the hill by mid afternoon today and then it's on to the Zebedee and Cordiale on the hill for the weekend, weather (as always) permitting. Straw baling has been moving on apace with 3 balers in the fields yesterday (thanks Brian). These will be planted with Catana Oilseed Rape behind the carrier and biodrill very soon. The wind is proving a mixed blessing at the moment: keeping the showers away or whizzing them through very quickly, but it is also hindering the bean desiccation and slug pellet application on the rape already planted, as always in this job there is a comprise to be made at some point or another. Carling have got their featured growers on their web site now, have a look, you might recognise someone on http://www.carling.com

Coors Barley Harvest

On Tuesday 28th July we started harvesting our winter barley crop, destined for the malt houses in Burton on Trent, grown under contract to Coors, which should end up being turned into Carling http://www.carling.com. The harvest was the first harvest in memory to actually have started on Bredon Hill as opposed to starting in the Vale of Evesham. The crop came off between and through some light showers but the strong wind enabled us to carry on until 1.30 am to finish the field before the predicted rain arrived yesterday. We harvest about 25 ha with moisture's ranging from between 18-21%. It will mean having to be dried, slowly through our drying plant twice. Drying will be slow and gentle, with not too much heat, to avoid damaging the germination, as this would make it useless for malting. Hopefully it should be OK and the premium should cover the extra drying costs. Samples have been sent off so see what the quality is like, we will soon know if the man from Frontier say YES!!

Spring Planting Apace

With the recent dry weather, yes it's been dry for at least 2 weeks, last time that happened was in 2003, or so it seems, the land has been dry enough to travel on. Gordon here > is drilling Tipple Spring Malting Barley on Bredon Hill. This is under contact to Coors, via Frontier Agriculture, to go to Burton-on-Trent to be made into Carling lager next year. The dry weather following the frost has given us lots of frost tilth and the seed bed is nice and fine. We put some nitrogen fertiliser into the seed bed before we cultivated it so that it was worked into the soil to surround the seedlings as they germinate to hopefully get them off to a really good start. Gordon is hoping to finish the field tonight before it rains, tomorrow.

On the 11th April we are having our annual Farm Lambing Day. Tractors and trailers will be leaving Overbury village hall, from 10am until 3pm, to take you up to Park Farm to see the lambing for yourselves. The game keeping dept, of Paul, Greg and Rod will also be there to uncover a few of the myths behind the dark and shady underground world of game keeping, accompanied by the stuffed or frozen usual suspects, friends or foe! Lunch will be available to purchase at the village hall from 12 am until 2pm, tea and coffee will be available all day. There is a small charge of only £5 for adults and children will travel free. It is a really super day out for all of the family, so bring them along, no matter what the weather is doing, and we'll be pleased to show you all about the lambing and sheep production here at Overbury. It got very busy last year between 11 and 1, so if you can try and get there early.