The Value of Long Grass – Leave some areas uncut! Allowing all types of grasses to grow longer in corners, along hedgerows and ditches will provide important seed and insect food for birds.  Longer grass also helps retain humidity and soil moisture, making it perfect for insect larvae and other[…]

3 different methods on Cheshire Farms Inter rowing v’s after harvest establishment Andrew Winward, Stapleford Hall Italian rye slot drilled after maize harvest 5th October rate of 32kg/ha Contractor cost £42 ha Good establishment but dependant on good weather conditions post harvest  Evan Jones Crewe Hall In association with Spunhill LG[…]

The Countryside Stewardship scheme is now open for applications. Some key changes have been introduced this year as part of Defra’s efforts to improve and simplify the scheme. Capital Grants Offer This year the two-year standalone Capital Grants offer has increased from 12 options in each category to 67 available[…]

What you need to know In 2022, Defra will be launching the first 4 ‘Standards’ of what will be a menu of 16 or more to be rolled out over the next 3 years.  For most situations, these payments can be accessed in 2022 and will make an important stepping stone[…]

Hedgerow Trees – Get prepared for the Sustainable Farming Incentive While the hedgerow standard isn’t being introduced until 2024 current guidance on likely standards includes information on hedgerow trees – and we have a lot of these in our local area! Payments and hedgerows trees required for 3 standards Standard[…]

Trees for Climate is a Defra backed national tree planting programme aiming to plant over 500 hectares of trees across England.  When mature, the trees will store carbon dioxide, playing an important role in the meeting net zero emissions targets as well as reducing flood risk, increasing sustainable UK grown timber and providing more places for nature and biodiversity to thrive. […]

Most farmland birds really benefit from the provision of additional seed Dec-April.  It gives the birds food through the late winter period when seed is in short supply (known as the hungry gap) and as they enter the breeding season.  Cereals and small seeds provide the most benefit.  Suitable small seeds include canary seed, linseed, oilseed rape, red[…]

It was a fantastic turnout for the first meeting of our Regenerative Agriculture Group with over 20 farmers braving the snow to look at the bale grazing set up at Poole Hall.  Huge thanks goes to Jane Oglesby and her team who hosted the meeting and treated us to a lovely lunch of her[…]

The next couple of months are a good time to catch up with jobs such as soil testing your fields and analysing manures, and with the price of fertiliser this year it is more important than ever to make sure that inputs are well managed.   Decisions about how much nutrient application is needed should be based on accurate[…]

The Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) is the first of Defra’s three new environmental land management schemes.   It is being phased in and we recommend that farmers take up SFI in 2022 as a way of getting familiar with the scheme and its processes ahead of further expansion.  There will be[…]