Barley ready to harvest

Combine has arrived

The wheat has been harvested thanks to a week of fairly good weather. Oats and beans to go!

Harvest safely gathered in!

We finished harvesting and all the straw has been baled up and brought into the barn.

So wet we can't harvest the potatoes

It has been so wet this autumn that we have been unable to harvest the potatoes from the field. It is a waste of food on the one hand, but the amount of fuel that would be needed to harvest them, the damage it would cause to the soil and the fact that it would probably cost more to harvest the potatoes than they are worth means that they will stay in the field.

Harvest complete

It may be a month late but we have finally completed the harvest - we are very thankful. We start planting the oil seed rape next week.

Better weather

Well we put the tent away at the end of the summer holidays and the weather has finally turned. Everyone I talk to seems a lot happier with the better weather that we have had this week. The wheat was very wet at the beginning of the week (25% moisture) and we have left it to dry in the field. The combine was getting stuck in the field it was so wet. Hopefully the weather will hold. If we have to dry the wheat because it it is too wet to go into storage then we have to burn a lot of diesel in the mobile drier and that adds to the production costs so fingers crossed ...

I miss lying in the tent at night and listening to the owls calling ... there is always next year.

Wet Harvest

We have been able to harvest the oil seed rape, but we are still waiting for better weather to harvest the wheat. Fingers crossed we might see a change in the next week or so. More news soon.

Cornwall

We have just been on holiday to Cornwall for a week. Check out the photos of the beaches - just beautiful. Now we are home and thoughts are turning to harvest - the wheat will soon be ready.

Another harvest picture

Living on a farm we take the beauty and the space for granted. How many harvests have there been since this tree was planted? Wonderful place to just sit for five minutes and get lost in your thoughts!

Potato Harvesting

The potatoes have been harvested we have photos to prove it! In the photos you can see the harvester getting the potatoes out of the ground and then they are put into the trailer running alongside. When the trailer is full, the tractor then takes the potatoes out of the field to either be stored or packed ready for the supermarkets, or perhaps made into crisps or chips!

Autumn coming

Autumn is coming, the leaves have really started to go yellow, orange and red, photos to follow soon. We are harvesting potatoes at the moment so it is good that it is keeping dry. I will load up the photos this week so you can see how potatoes are harvested in the field.

Harvest moon

At the end of a long day on the farm - we all sat in the garden and watched the sun set and the harvest moon rise over the Malvern Hills and the valley below - a day when we feel pleased with our labours!

Tipping the wheat in the grain store

We have already cleaned out the grain store ready for the wheat. The tractor and trailer reverse into the store and the grain is tipped onto the floor. The wheat stays there then until we need it for the chickens and then it is put back onto the trailer and taken around to the chicken houses and put into the bins that hold their feed.

Wheat - harvest

These three photos show the combine in action - the header is moving through the crop, inside the machine the wheat and the straw are separated - can you see the straw coming out of the back? When the combine is full of wheat, the wheat is put into a trailer and the tractor takes the trailer to the grain store. We store our wheat on the farm for our chickens to eat - zero food miles!

Wheat - moving the combine

When we move the combine to a new field it will not go through the gates on the farm, as it is too wide with the header on the front. You can see in the first photo that we take the header off the front of the combine and put it onto a trailer that is pulled by a tractor. The header is the part of the combine that cuts down the wheat and draws the plant into the combine so that we can separate the wheat from the straw. When we get into the new field the tractor and trailer and the combine are manouvered so that the combine driver can put the header back onto the combine. It is a very big machine and the driver has to be very accurate as he (or she) approaches the trailer. See second photo!

Harvesting the wheat

This picture shows the damage that the heavy rain has made on the crop, flattening it in places. On our farm the fields are the relatively small, compared to the large fields in East Anglia - see the old hedges around the edge - this makes combining a little more tricky for us. The combine starts by going around the field and you can see the straw that has been left behind. This will be baled up later with a baling machine. It has been sold to other farmers who will use it on their farms for their sheep and cattle.

Walking around the wheat fields

The wheat was nearly ready to be harvested and then it rained again! We check if the wheat is ready by rubbing an ear in our hands - blowing away the chaff and looking at, and biting, the wheat kernel. You can tell how ripe the wheat is by the colour and and how hard it is when you bite it. If you think it is nearly ready then you can check with a moisture meter.

Why is it important - if we harvest the wheat when it is too wet and then store it the wheat will deteriorate and can go mouldy. This could make it inedible for people and animals. We have to mechanically dry the wheat if it is too wet and this adds to the harvest costs so a farmer keeps checking and hoping it comes right.

It will need a few days to dry out when the sun finally comes out.

Oil seed rape - harvest

As you can see from the photos the rape seed is now in the storage shed awaiting collection to be turned into animal feed, vegetable oil, or biodiesel. The large "stalks" you see left in the field will in a month or so's time be cultivated back into the field and provide all the nutrients for next year's crop that will be planted.

So the blog now shows the full story of oil seed rape from planting to harvest.

Blackberries!

The blackberries are starting to ripen on the hedges - so we will soon be out picking them. Delicious with homemade muesli for breakfast!

Oil Seed Rape - Harvested!

Well we have harvested all the oil seed rape - the combines were busy on Sunday and Monday and we have all the seed stored in the shed. Check out the photos!