Spring has arrived and the crops are starting to really grow away but the oilseed rapeseed is a mess and it looks like 2023 harvest is going to be a financial disaster.
Ignorant and bigoted comment. The decisions are made based on enormous and rigerous investigations and tests. Read some of the other responses if you want to learn the truth
Government agri Policymakers need to support our Farmers to produce food here in UK where we can have quality guaranteed food. The current policies are Daft!! Harry is an excellent ambassador for Farming, he has a way of explaining to the general public that is clear and understandable. It's a pity our Government won't listen to the Farmers. Thank you for an excellent video. Let's hope for good growing weather now😊👍
We cannot risk killing the bees, or there will be no food at all. The commenter above speaks of the problem being the dust, and suggests using fluid insecticide, something which the government has not explored !!! They are, after all, only interested in keeping millionaires from paying any tax ! Sheisters, the lot of 'em.
I find your videos unbelievably interesting and informative, thank you so much for the effort you put into them. I just wish the damp government would watch, note and act on them!! Thanks Harry. 🙂🙂
Love watching your videos,maybe these sort of videos should be on tv as they are so educational to highlight the problems farmers face constantly Keep up great videos harry👍🏻
The issue with the seed dressing is that some of it comes off as a dust while operating air seeders and becomes airborne and spreads like mad. Back when Bayer was doing seed trials with Clothianadin (the newer neonic) they killed 350,000,000 (estimate) of their own testing bee hives from drift dust from planters alone. Worse is a lot of the newest planters now use brush conveyors that rub more of it off and blow it into the air. You can literally put a thin line of imidacloprid fluid down in the drill lines along with the seeds to avoid the seed-coat problems.
Just to clarify. So that blue colour on OSR seeds is the insecticide dressing that does for the cabbage stem flea beetle? But you can substitute that at the time of sowing by introducing a liquid insecticide as you plant? So why isn't Mr Metcalfe doing that?
Well, that is a good narrative. Also, your drill line method does not appear to be an efficient use of pesticide. There have been many rigorous studies, both the usual pre-licensing trials and the subsequent special reviews after imidacloprid insecticides were linked to bee colony collapses about 15 years ago. In Canada, where I farmed, after extensive review government agencies have concluded that seed treatments and coatings with neonicotinoid insecticides when used as directed were acceptably safe for canola (edible rapeseed) when used as directed, both for humans and the environment. (A special review was conducted for honeybees.) Machinery manufacturers and seed suppliers have also made technical advances in dust control for air seeding but fluidity agents for corn and soybeans licensed and approved for use are now more restricted. Even if the UK realizes it was off the mark too fast with bans and restrictions there will be no going back, only more narrative. It appears that there is going to be another expanded market opportunity for Canadian canola.
I have no idea why I follow a British farming channel so closely from Seattle, but when these videos drop they rise to No.1 on my watch-list. Always fascinating.
Hi Harry. I am a keen follower of your very interesting YT channel here in South Africa. Sorry about the rape crop. We also farm with oilseed rape in the Western Cape but here it is called Canola. Being a vegetable farmer myself, I grow rape (English Giant) for the many Malawian immigrants living in South Africa, only harvesting the leaves, much like spinach. All the best to you, looks like it is going to be another difficult year in UK farming, at least you have subsidies, over here we do not receive anything from the government.
The food manufacturers and supermarkets don’t pass on saving to customers, they just take the profits. So why not put import taxes onto foreign imports (that can be grown using UK banned pesticides) to give UK farmers a chance and also it stops condoning the use of banned chemicals in other counties. We need to be more self sufficient in food production (and energy!)
Something needs to change dramatically in our farming. I am 61 yrs old and the loss of bio diversity I have witnessed is just heart wrenching. Its not climate change its loss of habitat and our land management practices. However, we dress it we need a very bio diverse eco system or, we will fail. We must become more sustainable and start to work with nature, be a part of it and not apart from it. I confess I do not know the answer, we have to feed ourselves and if the CoVid debacle taught us anything it should be that we have to maintain our own food chain. Why don't we all by British and why don't farmers work amongst themselves in a huge Co-Op and sod the Supermarkets. Oh, and eat Venison !!!
Harry, so sorry to hear that things continue to be so tough just trying to make a living on a farm growing crops for us to eat. I honestly don't know how farmers keep on in the light of all of the adversity from the government, the weather and the international price lottery for your inputs and outputs. If I was young I wouldn't even consider farming, given the risk, I would be a Diversity coordinator for a small local council on about £100K. The world is a weird place at the moment.
Really educational and extremely interesting. I'm a car guy, and I honestly enjoy the farm more😮😊. Have you thought about not only trying the mixed legume environmental thing, but also a section of farm for glamping? Plenty of punters would pay to stay and glamp on your beautiful farm mate👍😅
Two things occur to me so far as the crops are concerned: The OSR is almost a dead loss, but there is little point in throwing more money at it for little or no gain. Secondly, gather the deer and sell them; at current live weight prices, that's going to be more profitable than the OSR!! - and without the fencing cost. I constantly find it frustrating and disappointing that the UK Government want to turn the countryside into a forest and wildflower meadow rather than looking to secure food security for the population. Provided that the supermarkets can import food and keep prices low, there is little possibility of the farming community and home grown food production being taken seriously - the recent suggestion that the UK uplands should no onger be grazed by sheep is further evidence of that (should you need it). It's entirely understandable that farmers will enter the 'fallow' scheme to move out of food production and into the seed mix - it's a more secure income for less financial risk.
What small acreage of OSR we have in Ceredigion [Cardiganshire] seems to be fully in flower. Aberystwyth University have a few acres at Morfa Mawr and a Mr George has a fair acreage down south. There’s a few fields here and there in between but not a lot.
@@sgtebilko no, only adult deer have babies, so you need adults to get more deer. Also, there is not a lot of meat on baby deer, makes no sense to kill them as babies then. Call it what it is, that group was all adult deer, not a baby in sight.
I knew it the flipping old car videos that’s why I have missed the farm so very very much indeed..I do understand if I had the chance too drive around in the new Ferrari ect so tempting. All the best Harry ciao ciao
Just the same sort of report that Jeremy Clarkson said, thats why he called his farm diddly squat. Clarkson 'made' £144.00 for the 1st year! With the subsidies being taken away, its very hard to see our farms carrying on. Supermarkets skinning the farmers alive whilst the government takes the subsidy. It will all end as a huge benefit to developers, maybe that was the Tories game plan all along. Few more £millions from the developers never goes astray. Like everything else they touch, just ends in ruins. We should all be worried, we saw what happened this year in the supermarkets when food shortages hit hard. The very LAST thing we need is the loss of farms.
Economically speaking the farm subsidies end up in higher land prices. It is a truism that all subsidies end up as rents. What's more farmland tends not to be where housing is required. So it is a low probability that subsidy withdrawal will help the Tories housebuilder mates. But, if you are going all economic on scrapping subsidies (and I think we should) then you need to be consistent and scrap all subsidies to all industries and services.
@@johnnunn8688 No, if you watch the videos you will see that he tried to keep his own money out of the farm costs.after the first year, he had no option. That said, what really got me, was the meeting with all the other farmers that Clarkson arranged. Was the lady dairy farmer, who said Clarksons shop, was her life line, after not paying herself a wage.she was just surviving. You really have to ask yourself, what will happen when all the subsidies stop? if farmers go bust, there's every reason to think they will. Who will buy up the land? Developers of course and then watch our countryside disappear fast. What of the food shortages this year in the super markets? All from abroad, because our farmers have stopped growing the crops they cant afford to grow. The food that comes from Europe is very heavily subsidised (CAP), which means, with no supplies of our own, just like fuel prices now, food costs will also go through the roof. Clarkson was lucky, in that he had the resources to try and diversify, as government asked. Even he, will not go on making a loss. Thats the point that the local council and planning committee missed, in that stopping Clarkson at every turn, will eventually make him sell up. The developers, backed by the Tories " we will build more houses" and no doubt backhanders from the developers to 'ease their way through the planning process. You can see were this is all going, cant you.
@@stevenfarrall3942 The very reason subsidies to farmers ever started was the more enlightened of us realised, that farming is not making w/machines. There are huge risks as Harry has shown together with all bureaucratic rules from everywhere make life on the farm very risky and sole destroying. As an example, Clarkson showed that the protection of badgers actually harms farms very seriously. As the dairy farmer told Clarkson she lost 60 head of cattle to Tuberculosis caught from Badgers. How can ANY farmer be expected to make a profit with those kind of rules that originate from people who have no idea about farms or Badgers
@@johnchristmas7522 Precisely. One set of flawed interventions by bureaucrats has to be ameliorated by another set of flawed interventions by another set of bureaucrats and so on ad infinitum. The end game is always some form of subsidy to ameliorate the preceding failures. Just scrap the whole thing. Farming is risky as business is risky. And if you are a land owning farmer arguably less risky than another business that rents is premises.
Hey Harry - guess what. You could have Vivaldi's Four Seasons as the theme music for your farm show. Get a Royalty free(old) recording of it. You could vary it according to the time of year for each episode.- Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. Each season has I recall 3 pieces so you would basically have a different tune for each month. And what wonderful tunes they are . . Come away oh human child to the waters and the wild.
Same decisions to be made here in the very near future, we completely ditched OSR some years ago as the risk was just too high. looking at AB15 you really do start to wonder why we bother.
It puts it into sharp focus - why on earth would you bother for £2k profit, especially when that could be wiped out with a tractor breakdown or the like. It's madness. All that risk for so little reward.
I could see the UK government financially incentivising farmers to not grow food and then down the road say oh look at all these framers not growing food we should really use that "wasted" farmland for other more important things like buildings.
Very disappointing about the rape. While I personally find it an unattractive crop, I do understand that it is important to be able to grow it in this country and I can well see your reluctance to take the risk again.
Was the OSR planted too early? Do you try and plant it before the Flea beetle takes a hold? Up where i live in Northumberland OSR is doing extremely well
No. Land values will only increase. Within 3 years average/ good land will be £20,000 an acre at least. Land is always a safe place to park a lot of money.
@@tom4412 Not if you lose money cultivating it. Before EU subsidies land used to be reasonably priced. What is holding land value up in UK is possibility of it becoming new housing development . So once we have proper housing recession land should be cheaper
@@xperyskop2475 it’s just as well people such as yourself will never be able to get their hands on land. Because you’d have absolutely no idea how to look after it. And you’d end up causing a nuisance to your farming neighbours. Who are trying to earn money from their land. For instance you might try and keep livestock, and have no clue how to keep them in your field.
Land prices will only go up, as large companies \corporations are buying vast amounts of it to offset their carbon (pollution). Food prices will rocket (if you can get any !) And the farmer will still get the blame for poisoning the planet !!!
Even the 2022 profits at a stated £37,000 is still not very good. For example, £37,000 is approximately the average salary in UK for average employed worker. About buying cars, I personally am totally opposed to taking out finance to buy cars, so it's a process of careful saving and investing over a multi year period. I have considered car finance and I just don't like it.
The further south you are, the temperature is slightly higher and the growing season starts proportionally earlier. In the south of England, crops are ahead of ours here in Scotland because of that extra few degrees warmer.
@@drummerboy1390 That's common sense - in fact, why we go on holiday there! But I was more wondering about why the crops there haven't been ravaged by the Cabbage Flea beetle... Perhaps the Breton's don't care about the EU ban on the pesticide, or have an exemption?
I understand why you need to put these chemicals on the crops and soil but doesn’t it get harder each year because of it? The soil gets thinner or depleted over time. Could you try going organic maybe?
Well at least Stanley looks a happy chap. I thought that there were still one or two neonicotinoids that weren't banned or was that only in the EU (acetamiprid).
Thanks, Harry I am not a farmer but have always been interested in how farmers try to maintain an income and growth in today's climate, weather, and politics, as far as I am concerned you are all heroes from arable to dairy to hill farms rearing sheep in challenging conditions. To you and all the others, hang in there as we need you, and to anyone else reading this who is not a farmer BUY BRITISH when you can.
Absolutely! How he lives in a multi million pound house in the stockbroker belt, a garage full of exotica, a yacht in the Med on approx 20K per annum is a calculation that defies explanation. He must have sold Evo magazine for huge money. Can't have been a good investment for the new owners... I don't even remember the last time I bought a car mag.
@@clownworld-honk410 pointless comment how many other farmers are in that position? None! He's also being honest about the financials and educating people for free...I guess that's lost on you though!
@@davidmg1925 It was the point I was going to make David. Self-made millionaire, no problem with that at all. His videos share with us the challenges that farmers everywhere, (millionaires or not) are going through, hats off to him.
Thank you Harry. The oilseed rape is in bloom here in Kent and making the place look magnificent. These videos are teaching me about the rural landscape where I live and make my dog walks more interesting. Thank you again.
A similar thing happened with the Orange industry here in Australia. carbendazim was banned but we kept importing orange concentrate from Brazil who use the chemical!
Thanks Harry, this year seems to be hitting the farmers very hard, and your cost and work load does not decrease in line with these changes. We should be focusing on our own farming communities and home crops to help. I wish you luck with future plans. Cheers Bob
I remember that previous "profit" and now 2K? Dear lord. I hope there are salaries for yourself and family in your costs. Fascinating as always. Hi from NZ. Farmers doing it tough everywhere I think. For all sorts of reasons.
UK government has not had an agriculture ministry for years it's a backwater of the environment department and the awkward kid they don't want. They would rather import cheap food from abroad. Good for keeping inflation down, good for the stock market supermarket dividends. Paying farmers to not grow food is crazy but that's where we find ourselves.
such a pity to produce "food" need so many different chemicals we used to grow potatoes when I was a kid all we did was dig a big trench put in some dung ( cow poop with straw mixed in) cover them with earth and there you go ....food helped along with some err processed grass!....
Another interesting update, Harry. UK agri-policy continues to baffle me. The government should be supporting our farmers towards food independence, but it often feels like the opposite is happening.
There is a very big disconnect between the ultimate consumer and the farming reality - the simple answer is farm producers have to increase their prices to ensure a reasonable profit and the consumer has to suck up the supermarket price rises needed. However, when we have 'Global' business models and cheap imports from places that don't follow best practices or can use treatments banned to us then as a producer you are held at knife point by the supermarket or food processors. This is where Government needs to step in and create a fairer playing field. I shan't hold my breath
Something is really wrong when it's more profitable to not produce food, it's ridiculous how politicians, with no idea, decide things that effect the fundamental basis of our existence.
It's ridiculous to imply that farmers, who profit from environmental deregulation, should get to deregulate their industry. They've done what they wanted to for centuries and all we have to show for it is an island that's basically devoid of wildlife, one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world. Politicians are generally stupid - so we need environmental experts in charge of environmental regulation instead. Maybe then we can have rivers and lakes that aren't full of sewage and fertiliser, and wild land that isn't just grassy desert.
Would love to see a Harry’s Farm video covering farming chemicals sometime. What’s needed, what’s banned, what’s controversial and maybe even scratch the surface of how Monsanto and Bayer operate when it comes to their products!
I must be in the minority. We live in south Worcestershire on the edge of the Cotswolds. I understand the need and economics of OSR but have always regarded the giant fields of bright yellow OSR as a relatively modern blot on the landscape. Much prefer a green or golden cereal crop landscape.
Any chance you could do an update video on your solar panels with comparison against your turbine for power production? Looking forward to more regular videos again. 👍
Here in Brittany the fields are full of lovely yellow bloom. The flours started about 5 weeks ago. So I can't see how it's the pesticide ban that's preventing healhy crops.
Same story on costs and return here in Central Canada. A lot of farmers belong to a co-op where grains etc are dried, stored and held until sold to market. It can help with better returns but it can hurt when prices don't rebound and you have co op fees to pay but at least we're not completely tied to the price offered at harvest. Cheers 🇨🇦
They will do what the highest bidder asks them to do. Either a lobbyist for a corporation or an evil lunatic like Soros just wanting to destroy nations: whomever pays them enough, the politicians of either major party will enact what they want.
The Tories would prefer to see farmers fail, and then their friends scoop up the land for cheap. It baffles me that people are still unable to understand who and what Tories do when they're in power. Hopefully they're not going to be in power much longer however, what a state they've left the UK in.
We are having the same issues in Australia. The farm support industries is pricing themselves out of the industry. What will end up is that farmers will just stop producing and they will have no market. There could be a considerable shortage of exports here as we have had some of the biggest recurring floods in history.
Before returning to farming I did 30 years in haulage, what this taught me was that no matter how bad things got. there was always the next wanna be millionaire waiting in the wings to have a go.
I often wonder why we need so much oil seed rape? I hate the smell of the crop and don't like the taste of the products it is used in. My wife is allergic to it, so I will admit that I am biased. There are other crops that yield oil, so if flea beetle is such a problem, why can't farmers switch to alternative crops?
I cycled around a few fields of yellow yesterday in the north Cotswolds area - around Bredon Hill. You could smell the crop. Always looks really beautiful. In fact, a friend took me up in his single engined plane 4 years ago and the rape fields always look the best.
As a mischievous teenager I once rode an enduro bike through a rape field in full flower (along a tram line). I learnt a valuable lesson doing that!! Me, my clothes, the bike, all came out looking like Big Bird from Sesame Street! Didn't ever do that again.
I ran across a field today (footpath goes straight across) and came out the other side covered in yellow and eyes streaming. Was wheat last year. Their rape crops look pretty healthy.
A bit further north than Harry, the fields around me with solid dense yellow. Could just be that Harry got unlucky this year, and one farm doesn’t necessarily paint a true picture of what’s going on.
In my small experience of farming I could never make out the pricing structure which always seemed to be against the farmer. When I bought seed, fertiliser and sprays etc I had to pay the price that the supplier quoted, like it or not. Come harvest time I got paid the price set by the market at the time. In both cases the prices were set by someone else so I had no control over them at all. If I had the benefit of storage space then things may have been better but with volatile prices and the cost of another building it never seemed worth it. Very glad I saw the light and got out of the rat race but I take my hat off to all the farmers who still go at it no matter what.
Why are we being told there is a world shortage of wheat because of Ukraine's problems yet the price of wheat is falling? Must be one the hardest ways of making a living when so many agencies are against you including mother nature.
