Well, Cereals is over for another year.  It was an even bigger show, and I saw less this year than last as we were busy meeting you all on the stand.  It may have been wet, but the rain was welcome unless you had hay on the ground.  Whilst there I was filmed by both the Farmers Weekly, talking about the new-season fertiliser prices (click here to watch the video) and but also by Country Channel TV.  There will be a short piece on the TFA out later in the year.

Talking to Ian Bell from the ARC Addington Fund whilst at Cereals

It was back to reality on Friday, spraying ear wash.  The wheat on the heavy land looks poor so to avoid too much cost they have had Riza(tebuconazole) @ 0.6l/ha.  I can only hope they yield better than they look when the combine starts to roll.  Mustard is getting Riza too to keep it shorter/standing (I hope) and take it through to harvest.  In the spring beans bruchid eggs are on the first pods, the mildew is back, so octolan, phorce, and Hallmark Zeon will be used in 200l water and very early in the morning as we have a resident beekeeper with 5 hives on the beans and mustard.  The crop looks promising though.

In the two weeks before the last ever Royal Show and then the Great Yorkshire I am taking a break with 2 pals to do some more of the Normandy WW2 sites.  We did some at the 60th anniversary and still have more to do.  It is an experience that really puts it into perspective on how well off we are, and I would encourage you all to make the effort and take your children; it has proved very levelling for us.

I hope to have a draw of lambs for the 25 June, the same day as I will be interviewing for the new adviser at Theale so I will have to be organised.  Had the sheep all in today and jabbed the ewes for BTV8 and gave the lambs a dose of wormer as there is evidence of worm load in the dung.

Irrigation starts again on Tuesday if it doesn’t rain.  I will be in France, phew, if nothing else at least I am keeping as far away from the irritator as I can!