A SUFFOLK FARM

Press, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 26633, 19 January 1952, Page 5

A SUFFOLK FARM

Highly Efficient Management INTENSIVE CROPPING POLICY To illustrate the intensiveness of cropping in present-day English farming, to which he referred in an interview on this page last week, Professor A. H. Flay, head of the farm management and valuation department at Lincoln College, has described a 351 acre farm in Suffolk, which is bioadly typical of large areas of East Anglia. He emphasises that livestock play a relatively less important part than crops though the climate is ideal for livestock production from grass, and not, by our standards, anything like an ideal climate for producing grain.

Professor Flay said that since the beginning of the second world war, Britain had striven to produce all the food possible from its own soil. Therefore, of the 24,000,000 acres of cropping and sown grass land «in England, over 6,000,000 ,acres were in grain crops, of which over 2,000.000 were in wheat. The climate of England was eminently suitable for grassland production but grain was produced all oyer England, with particclar emphasis on grain in the drier eastern counties. In Suffolk, for instance, up to two-thirds and more of every arable farm was annually under grain crops.

The management of one of these Suffolk farms was studied in some detail by Professor Flay. The farm is of 351 acres, on flat to very gently rolling country. The soil is a rather impervious clay, which needs tile draining in parts. The rainfall for the district is 23 inches a year, but in the absence of anything comparable to the drying Canterbury nor'-westerly winds, would be equivalent to possibly 40 inches in Canterbury. Rainfall is well spread, and the winters cold, with occasional snow.

Heavy Cropping Last season, this 351 acre farm grew 99 acres of wheat, 46 of oats, 32 of barley, 34 of linseed, 49 of potatoes. 52 of sugar beet, and 7 acres of peas which were picked for sale in the London vegetable markets. The rest of the farm was occupied in 21 acres of Italian and red clover for hay, a five acre holding paddock, and six acres taken up with buildings and waste land. “That was 340 acres under crop,’’ said Professor Flay. “The programme was regarded as being a full cropping programme in the area, but cropping at that level of intensity was by no means uncommon there. The farm was surrounded for perhaps 10 or 15 miles on every side by others carrying on much the same sort of programme of intensive cropping. One dairy farm and one fruit farm in all that district were all that relieved what one might almost say was the monotony of intensive cropping.” Average yields for the tarm are 50 bushels of wheat, 68 bushels of oats. 52 bushels of barley, 6 tons of table potatoes, 11 to 12 tons of sugar beet, 9cwt of linseed, and 1? tons of hay. The rotation is roots (sugar beet and potatoes) into wheat, into oats and barley, and sow down with 20 acres or so of the oats and barley. “The significant fact in fertility maintenance on this farm is that one third of the whole farm is given farmyard manure every year,” said Professor Flay. “It is usually put on to the ground intended for potatoes and sugar beet, and on to the hay area. This manure is applied at the rate of 7 to 8 tons to the acre. In addition, the root crops receive a complete Nitrogen-Potassium-Phos-phate manure at the rate of 12cwt for potatoes, and lOcwt for sugar beet. The wheat crop that follows is not sown with manure, but the second white straw crop is given 3cwt of the complete manure, and lewt to l|cwt of nitro chalk broadcast on the crop in the spring. The only fertility restoration through grass is on the 20 acres or so used for hay!” - “They hay is used to feed the 70 head of cattle which are yard and stall fattened, mainly through the winter, during the farmyard manure producing process. Beet tops, beet pulp, barley and oat straw, with a little concentrates are also fed to these fattening cattle. All straws left after heading the grain crops are baled anc used for bedding for the cattle, and some for feeding them. When fat, the cattle sell for about £75 a head, and represent a (turnover of £25 to £3O a head for the six months of indoor feeding. There is no profit in the cattle themselves.’’ On this farm, the only other livestock were 150 to 200 pigs, which were fed in houses. They were bought as stores and fattened to about 2001 b and sold as bacon. They were given barley. sugar beet pulp and smal’ potatoes. If the barley crop on the farm made malting grade, it was sold about 1205.' and feed barley bought is about 80s. The pigs also, of course, produced farmyard manure. Labour Employed

The farm employs 9 men and two youths permanently. Seasonal casual labour is used only for potato picking. Extra labour required in the spring for hand hoeing sugar beet and weeding potatoes where necessary, was provided for by putting the permanent farm staff on contract to do the work. The men worked very long hours, during the contracting period, probably about half as long again as their ordinary 47-hour week, but their returns were equivalent to about twice or more their normal wage. The farmer considered that this system paid him handsomely, and the men were keen on it. Wages, including casual wages, were about £3OOO a year.

The farm was very well equipped with machinery. It used four tractors, one of them a large diesel wheel tractor which was fitted with half tracks in the winter, two heavy wheel petrol tractors, and a light petrol tractor. There was a 12-foot American auto header, potato planter, potato digger, pick up hay baler, a spraying plant for the potatoes, and a full range of the normal cultivation implements, drills and so on.

“This is a very efficiently managed farm, produces at a high level, and is a profitable undertaking.” said Professor Flay. “To a New Zealander the cropping programme looks very heavy indeed, but while the present manurial programme is carried on. the heavy cropping programme can probably be continued for a long time. It is a great business, but I am still wondering about the farmyard manure side of it. Something like 800 tons of manure has to be handled every year. Portions of it are handled twice, when it is necessary to clear a cattle pen before the field is readv to receive the manure. Perhaps the farmyard manure carting and spreading is needed to keep the men employed during slack time in the off season.” About half the farms in the district were tenant farms, on which rents were about £2 an acre as a fairly general average figure. Rents in Britain had not jumped like land values, because landlords were reluctant to increase the cost of food through increasing rents. Most of these Suffolk farms would have substantial homesteads, and four or five attached cottages as well as a range of farm buildings, which were not in all cases adequate for housing the big range of machinery now general on British farms. The contrast this Suffolk district offered with Canterbury was its absence of stock in the fields on pasture, and signs of fat lamb and small seeds production. At first sight the climate would appear ideal for ryegrass and clover seed production, but the showery and humid summer made harvesting of ryegrass and white clover very difficult and uncertain. “Britain can grow excellent ryegrass and white clover, but can't harvest it.” said Professor Flay. "I believe that because of this, there will always be a market for our ryegrass and white clover in Britain. On the other hand, timothy and cocksfoot can be harvested under their conditions, and they are already growing more than their own requirements.”