neilw Posted June 24, 2009 Author Share Posted June 24, 2009 I wasthinking more along the lines of being the contractor all be it small scale in commparison to some, while growing a sizeable portion of wheat, osr, beans myself. Is this viable, or would there be to much work trying to both, but mastering neither?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eurodeere Posted June 24, 2009 Share Posted June 24, 2009 No reason not to do both, plenty of contractors do their own crops plus share farming plus general contracting. I would say keep it simple on the home farm and on the share farming so that you can be punctual and offer a good service. No good turning up late. You can have as much kit as needed if your contracting and can offer baling service etc etc. If your basing it on your area then have a look at what people are doing and the tractors etc used. No good having a Quadtrac and huge tillage train if your in western Cornwall. The home farm could be wheat and OSR alternating with a regular dose of slug pellets from the quad bike. Top down with an Opico seeder to drill the rape after wheat. Straight in with the Rapid for drilling the wheat into the rape stubbles, job done. Ploughs, Carriers, Solo's etc etc for the 1000's of acres of contracting, the customer knows best. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neilw Posted June 24, 2009 Author Share Posted June 24, 2009 So it is viable to do both?? The idea for my set up comes from a contractor who also grows his own, the only difference between his and mine is i want modern machinery (Topdown instead of simba discs, brand new 8690 instead of 10 yr old fendt 926, you get the idea...) and he grows maize, beans, linseed, but primarily OSR and Wheat. Seems to be a biggish operation,using only Fendt 818 and 926, Cat challenger, Bateman self propelled sprayer and 2 mf 38 combines. There is also 2 44 ton artic DAFs run as a seperate part of the business that help with grain haulage...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eurodeere Posted June 25, 2009 Share Posted June 25, 2009 Yes, it's possible and you do actually have everything sorted. One day the contractor will need to upgrade and he can follow your example by buying a topdown and 8690. He is obviously runing older kit to keep depreciation and loan costs down. Everything he has is probably payed for and diligent out of season servicing allows him to run older kit. Run the kit 24/7 in season and you can cover some ground. He's also kept the cropping simple. From what your saying you don't want to get into general contracting? Maize is grown for grain or sold for silage? One thing you need to think about is grain carting, are you doing it with tractors, are you getting trucks in or are you going to sub contract to some farmers sons who will cart for you at below cost price? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Light Land Posted June 25, 2009 Share Posted June 25, 2009 Good reading this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neilw Posted June 25, 2009 Author Share Posted June 25, 2009 grain haulage is another topic, I had not researched the suject fully, was going to invest in some 20 ton capacity trailers to match my combines output (with a view to maybe getting another combine) but hit upon the maximum road haulage weight snag for agricultural vehicles. I'm looking in to weather a 20 ton tailer and something like a mog (Unimog) or a fastrac run as a road haulage unit all year round would be easable. I'd like to grow maize, which would be sold on as silage. again, the haulage aspect comes in to play. When you say general contracting, do you mean ploughing, seeding, spraying type operations?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eurodeere Posted June 27, 2009 Share Posted June 27, 2009 General contracting, I include ploughing, baling, silage, hedgecutting etc, infact all types of farm tasks. Running Unimogs and Fastracs as commercial haulage is possible but how many outfits do you see like this in the UK? I would suggest conventional artic's are cheaper to run, no proof though. Haulage is a pretty cut throat business, it could be cheaper to hire in the number of trucks needed for a job. If you run your own trucks you need to find other work for them for most of the year then stop the task for harvest. Maize hauling with trucks is not a good idea, you'd need all wheel drive ones like in Holland then a huge decompaction job to get the soil back into shape. I think in your situation grain maize would make more sense. I would go for self employed local farmers sons with a tractor and trailer each, cheap, upto date equipment and excited to drive all day and most of the night. Gross train weights are a huge problem and the boy's in blue will only look more and more at this, sub contract the haulage and if they are overloaded it's their problem! You order the number of trailers you need for a specific farm/field and don't have excess capacity for short hauls. Maybe have a chaser bin to get the grain off the combine to the headland, this will reduce compaction problems and keep the combines running. If you are contract combining are you running the combines together or sending to different farms? Some customers may want to haul their own grain and this will change the logistics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neilw Posted June 27, 2009 Author Share Posted June 27, 2009 I think im over complicating things, probably better to stick to Wheat, OSR, barley and beans and sub contract the hauling, like you say... As far as the contracting goes i'd like to do general farm tasks, harvest wise send one combine to a contract and the other for my own, and move them as needed..... My girlfriend thinks im taking this all way to seriously!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neilw Posted June 28, 2009 Author Share Posted June 28, 2009 Am I right in thinking that you can only grow OSR once every 5 years in a rotation?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robbo Posted June 28, 2009 Share Posted June 28, 2009 Its not just OSR it is any plant of the Cruciferae genus, all Brassicas are susceptible to club root and if they are grown too often there will be a build up of fungus in the soil and problems for many years to come. After time the fungus in the soil reduces to an acceptable level but one after years crop it will be back to high levels again Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ploughmaster Posted June 29, 2009 Share Posted June 29, 2009 Am I right in thinking that you can only grow OSR once every 5 years in a rotation?? In general that is so, for the above mentioned reasons. However some farms are growing it much closer (one year in three), and there was one farmer in scotland who was featured in Farmers Weekly a couple of years ago who has been growing continuous rape on one field for about 18 years. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eurodeere Posted June 29, 2009 Share Posted June 29, 2009 As already mentioned you shouldn't plant brassicas too close but people do. People also plant continuous wheat, there is a take all risk in the early years and yield penalties but after things can settle down and you have the simplest rotation possible, wheat! Combine the wheat, bale the straw, spread plenty of farm muck or treated sewage sludge, work that in with the Topdown and wait until October to splash a bit of roundup on from the sprayer and plant the next crop with the Rapid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neilw Posted June 29, 2009 Author Share Posted June 29, 2009 It dont come much simpler than that does it!!! so you could potentially grow continuos wheat in 1 field, continuous osr in another, thus removing the need for a rotation??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.