Author: Mike Stanbridge

In the early 1970’s we installed a state of the art grain processing plant on the farm.  It could handle an almost magical 8tonnes of wheat an hour.  Dad and Derek spent days bolting it together and it,  along with the building it lives in, became a major landmark of the farm, an indicator of modern thinking and farming investment.

Today we started taking it down.

8t/hr simply won’t cut it.  Geoff’s combine will comfortably bring in 20t/hr.  The modern combine even cleans it of dust and chaff to an equivalent standard of the 1970’s kit.   It’s also no longer acceptable for diesel to be used to dry the grain.  So,  for the last 5 years it’s sat idle.  Worse than that it’s been taking up space that could otherwise be used for storage, something we’re short of now we’ve got the brewery on site.

So,  it has to go.   I’ve found making the decision really hard as it’s literally taking apart my father and grandfather’s legacy something I seem to be doing in a variety of different ways…

I think I’m doing the right thing for the business but have a huge feeling of reticence in doing so.

As part of this progress we’re turning the barn around, ensuring that farm use is kept away from the more public areas and allowing Dad’s house to be more of a private space.   We’ve also cleared behind the old hay barns and tidied the back meadow significantly.

It’s a massive change!

Now we’re more public facing the grounds appearance has become much more of a “thing”.  We’ve been mowing the various grass areas,  entrance way etc using a combination of a garden husqvana and a 1960 MF35 (my favourite tractor).  Neither are the right tool for the job and both have reliability challenges.

We had a demo of this today.   Do we buy it?

My thinking is that it’s bigger,  faster,  uses red diesel (so cheaper to operate) is designed for commercial operations and has a good design to cope with our banked slopes.

My grandfather had a saying “as a farmer you need to learn to do 6 days work in 3, and 3 days work in 6.”  In other words, work flat out in the busy times and accept the quieter times with grace.

Farming wise we’re in a watching mode,  hoping that mother nature gives us the right amount of rain to support our young plants. Not too much to drown them,  not to little so they don’t get the nutrients they need to prosper.

To keep his team busy Geoff and team have cleared behind an old hay barn,  there is so much room!  We’re going to temporarily move in a few local tradespeople with storage and skips etc.  Will keep the site active over winter, improve security and bring a little money in.

The pause in arable work also means there’s an opportunity to plan for the next few months and as always we have some big plans.  On this visit we:

• Agreed a plan for a container coffee shop to become a hub for the glamping, hopefully open to the public too (subject to all sorts of challenges,  planning etc)
• Worked out what we’re going to do with moving the power “head” so we can progress the demolition of the inside of the barn
• Discussed drainage with the brewery,  this one has been a headache for us all and we really need to fix it quickly
• Reviewed plans for the new houses.  Annoyingly we didn’t have our big meeting as we didn’t have enough information.  We’ve rescheduled though
• Continued our clear out of the old woodshed, hopefully to become part of our offering around the coffee shop
• Agreed a demo of a new mower.  A kioti zero turn will soon be coming for a trial
• Reviewed and allocated actions from our health and safety review
• Tried kitebuggying on one of our wheat fields (sorry Geoff).

I’m away on holiday soon so the next update will be late November.   In the meantime if you have any thoughts,  advice, ideas,  suggestions or simply want to find out more then please do say “Hi”.

As many of you know,  I work 9 days a week as a Business/Supply Chain consultant for HSO and the other day I spend at the farm planning the next few weeks and looking for future opportunities.

I haven’t posted for the last few weeks as nothing significant has happened.   We simply move on with the heartbeat of farming life.  We’re fortunate that most of next year’s crop is in the ground (and disappointed that one of our rape fields needed resowing), that most of our cereal crop has been sold and that the rest of the new seasons crop grows well.   Geoff and his team are now watching the plants grow and supporting them as much as they can.

So for me yesterday was more about maintenance and future thinking than “doing”.  I’ll talk you through it,  let me know if it’s worth a similar fortnightly (ish) update.

Met with Paul from Olivers to load and despatch our old fertiliser spreader, we also talked about a potential new “zero turn” mower for the new season.  Let’s see if the prices are right…

Dad’s car is also struggling,  well it was struggling when Alison and I gave it to him about 8 years ago,  it’s now got 200,000 miles and needs changing, so,  we went car (window) shopping.   We think we have a plan for the winter now… if anyone has feedback on a 4xe jeep avenger I’d love to hear it.

Then it’s about thinking about next summer.  I’ve promised I’d clear an old storeshed/chickenshed/logshed before Easter so got stuck in.   Still lots to do and was surprised to find my old scalextrix and lego train buried in there.   Sadly now too late for my son to use it.

Now into the afternoon i had a great chat with Geoff (farm contractor) about how we’re going to reorganise the farmyard, welcome a landscaper to site, to get rid of old farm scrap and equipment and clear an area around the old hay/straw barns to enable a conversation to offices/shop/holiday lets.  It’s a long term plan but good to start the journey.

Finally a catch up with Steve and Tobi about what to do with our new containers, the Farrmyard event next weekend etc.

I ended up leaving at about 7.  A long day and I hope one that will see some real changes in the next few weeks.

I think that’s it… Next visit brings Alistair back to the farm and we’ll need to talk all things http://www.northhemel.co.uk and our own planning.

I hope you find this as entertaining as I did.

Currently at the farm and this ballet of telehandlers put on a show for me.   Clearly the wagon needed loading with wheat quickly but do you think that it’s quicker with two?

As part of the forthcoming housing our partners are performing a preliminary investigation of the archeology of the area.   It’s intriguing to Dad and I as we know there is an abandoned medieval village in our parkland and we occasionally find coins etc.   We await the results with interest!

About 300 tons of barley has already left the farm, about half the wheat is in the shed and the team are hugely active.

It really is the busiest time of year but also one of the most rewarding, you can see progress as you work across a field and have a sense of achievement with every little milestone.

If you’re reading or watching this, please do give the next tractor you see a little wave.  They are likely working long hours and what’s in the back of their trailer could be on your kitchen table soon.

Already?!?

I’ve never seen harvest this early and even Dad noted that it was rare (3 times in 70 years) for it to have started on my grandfathers birthday – 18th July.

We have some interesting challenges in terms of grain storage this year.  Because the brewery are now installed we don’t have use of our major grain store at all.  That means we will need to sell this barley “off the combine” meaning that just like Clarksons farm it will go into a temporary outdoor heap and be bucketed up into HGV’s as quickly as we can organise them.  We will need that area clear for the wheat (30% sold “off the combine”, the rest stored) and then finally the beans.  We’re expecting a really early harvest this year with the potential of even the Beans being harvested in July (usually early September).  So if you want to see the combines working locally you need to get out there soon.

In other news, we’ve had conversations about removing some legacy grain handling equipment and are in discussions about a regular coffee van at the farm.  More news soon I hope.

Sometimes nothing happens then sometimes everything happens.  It’s the nature of farming and I remember my late Grandfather (repeating his grandfather) saying “a good farmer can do 6 days work in 3 and 3 days work in 6”, meaning that you flex your effort and energy based on what needs doing not an arbitrary 8 hours…  The advantage of arable farming of course is that you do – occasionally – get the breaks.

Anyway, it’s harvest time so that means while thinking of the next few weeks of activity we also need to plan what will be sown when.  We need to organise not only the combine but also the primary cultivation and sowing and for oilseed rape this all needs to happen before the middle of August.

That means I have next year’s cropping plan.  It’s quite heavily influenced by the performance of last year’s crops, the market predictions, the needs of the soil and this year the impact of the housing development.

The yellow areas will be Oilseed rape, harvested in the next week or so and, some digestate applied (known to farmers as rocket fuel as it’s that good nutritionally) then primary cultivation and sowing.

The cropping map is once again available on the front page if you want to refer to it.

So the team will be busy, if you see them working give them a wave and a smile.  Even better take pics and share them.  It’s an exciting and rewarding time of year for us (even though we’re tired) so we appreciate a wave.