Farm Diary

Our woods are full of primroses, anemones and bluebells, the oak is leafing and is before the ash this year at Plaistow (dry summer?), and the hedgerows are greening up nicely, with hawthorn blossom drifts like snow around the field perimeters.

There is some activity around the badger sets, with evidence that our healthy (take note Hilary Benn) badgers are starting their spring clean-out. The clay soil is still too wet for turnout but I suspect we will have some cows out by the time you read this if it stays dry.

I drilled the first 70 acres of maize a week ago, and although everyone thinks I am mad, my reasons are sound.

I know that we as farmers are supposed to drop our trousers at this time of year and rest our bare buttocks on the soil, only drilling if this experience is comfortable, but things can change very quickly, and only time will prove me right or wrong.

We had worked hard on the seed-bed and it came down very well behind the harrows, an invitation to drill as it were, and the land at Tillington is light, on a south- facing slope '“ early ground.

We are growing a lot of maize this year, and this acreage only represents 10 per cent of the total, so I decided to spread the risk by starting to drill last week, just in case we go from winter to summer in the next week or so, and then we would lose all the moisture out of the seed bed, just as we did last year.

I also want to cut Tillington early in the autumn to get maize in the diet. We are really getting on top of our maize preparations, with most of our ground almost ready for drilling. We shall, however, hold back for a few more days before we drill any more.

While there are food riots in some parts of the world, Defra has been discussing the 'carbon footprint' of hedgerows, which, I'm sure you will agree, is vastly more important and causing no end of anxiety to the average person in the street.

Has the pressure from environmentalists to cut hedges every two or three years increased the carbon footprint? Now that hedge-cutting machinery is cutting two or three years' growth, it seems that it might be emitting more than two or three times the pollution of cutting hedges annually.

These are the important matters that occupy the minds of those who find themselves increasingly making matters worse by attempting to make things 'greener'.

Defra has had savage cuts in its budget and there are vast areas of its buildings in London without people in them since the end of March.

I understand that the voluntary redundancy scheme was universally taken up as no one really wants to stay put. There is still no senior veterinary officer in place, and with TB (now Wales has taken the lead), disease cost-sharing and bluetongue, etc, I am sure there is not a long queue of people wanting this particular job.

The Nitrogen Vulnerable Zones announcement will be made soon and that is not going to be popular either, but the aftermath of the new legislation will mean that the whole country will be treated to the nasty smell that drifted across London and the south-east from Holland last week.

Once the NVZ legislation is in place, all farmers affected will be spreading muck on the same day after not being allowed to spread little and often throughout the winter. With an average on-farm cost of 50,000 to 60,000 for extra slurry storage to comply, all that muck will be shifted in the small window available once the date for field application has been reached. Another great idea from those who consider themselves environmentalists.

Congratulations to Robert Ranson on his re-election as Milklink Co-op main board director.

Robert, who farms at Bowlhead Green, Godalming, Surrey, has been a director of Milklink for the past six years, and has looked after the small number of south-east Milklink suppliers very well indeed, which is not easy when the Co-op is based in and mostly supplied from the south-west, which is very different milking country indeed.

Well done, Robert. I suspect that many dairy farmers in West Sussex are very pleased and sleeping easier at night.

This feature was first published in the West Sussex Gazette on April 23, 2008. To see it first, buy the West Sussex Gazette every Wednesday.