Reporting from this source, summarised, rewritten or translated and published under its name · 105 stories
AgribusinessHMRC's illustrative rates suggest about £3.77 a tonne on ammonium nitrate in the first year, far below earlier estimates, but a farmer warns the charge rises steeply from 2030.
CropsRothamsted traps show more than half of bird cherry-oat aphids winged and nearly 40% carrying virus, and AHDB's new BYDV model puts the cost of an untreated early-drilled wheat crop at £90-210/ha.
Dairy farmer Ewan McCracken is building a 370m cow track to a 3.5ha grazing block with shaley rock dug from his own outcrops, after counting what each white line infection really costs.
OpinionColumnist Sam Walker compares the worries of British farmers with those his Zimbabwean work-experience student Blake Van Rooyen grew up with, from locusts to foot-and-mouth.
CropsAt the Centre for Sustainable Cropping near Dundee, barley after beans needed 22kg/ha less nitrogen and yielded 1.2t/ha more in four of five years, though not in the dry 2022 season.
Will Fryars and his father built 42 prototypes over eight years before patenting a bolt-down, self-locking steel shroud that holds an ATV's front wheel and releases with a key fob.
LivestockAt Town Barton Farm near Crediton, Jack and David Munday cut costs by grazing up to 280 days a year, calving in an autumn block and breeding robust crossbred cows that give 118% of bodyweight in milk solids.
AgrotechRobert Scott sent soil pH maps to Meta AI from his tractor cab and got a lime recommendation, an order total and a variable-rate plan for his contractor in minutes, though rising costs still weigh on arable margins.
LivestockThe Rare Breeds Survival Trust says 60% of breed societies report members struggling to obtain bluetongue vaccine, with coverage below 20% in some rare breeds, and has asked Defra for smaller packs and vaccine-sharing guidance.
AgrotechA reworked front end lets the five/six-furrow mounted reversible run on-land behind high-power tracked or wide-tyred tractors, with hydraulic furrow-width setting and a turnover that does not need the plough pulled in.
EnvironmentAfter the driest April-to-September in more than a century, the Environment Agency declared severe drought in Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Somerset and East and West Sussex, and will step up checks on farm water abstraction.
CropsProvisional Defra figures put English barley production at 3.7m tonnes, down 11%, and wheat at 10.8m tonnes, up 0.8%, while feed barley trades at a wide discount to wheat.
LivestockAHDB's beef genetics lead says recorded data and breeding values help find efficient cows, while a building specialist shows a Cambridgeshire shed with a quarter of the roof ventilation its 45 cows need.
