We collate the financial and market data relevant to UK agriculture, so you can view the latest prices, analyse trends over time and compare prices between UK livestock markets.
Visit the UK’s leading indoor agricultural event, with eleven packed halls of the very latest in agricultural machinery and equipment. Now at the NEC, Birmingham this is free to attend and free to park.
The Open Gardens went well and we had some lovely comments, although thanks must really go to the previous owners as we are only trying to maintain what they laid out.
With many growers likening the weather conditions of the last twelve months to the drought of 1976, I think many of us had convinced ourselves that we would be experiencing another hot and dry start to the summer.
As I write this article on June 24, I must admit to feeling somewhat tired of listening to the rain battering off my bedroom window at 5am, an occurrence that has been quite regular over the last month.
We had some reasonable early April rain in most places. In complete contrast to this time last year, we could do with a good bit more rain to keep everything on-track.
Writing in mid-February, and with the icy start we had to the month – not to mention well over two inches of rain in the past week – we are very glad we did not rush into much in the way of early fieldwork.
Managing risk is a key attribute of arable farming with weather, markets and of course politics creating uncertainty and easily derailing short-term plans.
The New Year has started as 2018 finished, warmer and drier than average. Although we have now had some frosts and even a small fluttering of snow, ground conditions are still unseasonably good.
The calm, dry start to the New Year provided a welcome opportunity to give late-drilled wheats after roots and vegetables a timely residual herbicide top-up with extra contact action to deal with weeds that continued to emerge in another decidedly warm December.
The cold weather has finally arrived and the end of January looks set to be cold, albeit mostly dry. Indeed, the winter weather so far has been kind (perhaps too kind?) with temperatures barely dropping below zero and rainfall almost insignificant for this time of year.