Oakley Estate Farms

[Paul Palmer]

Just for you Paul, the Oakley fleet of tractors & trailers

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thanks for posting up Alex,a very impressive fleet

[Oakley Farms]

If you give up the spuds I would gladly take all your spud gear off your hands as you have some great kit

Cheers, i'll bear that in mind

[Guest]

 Now now no pushing in on that spud kit  should  Oakley go "potatoe free " i asked Alex  ages ago  im sure i did ha ha! 

[Oakley Farms]

Iv just been through and revised my rotation so now i can drill a cover crop between wheat snd spuds, so no luck on giving up spuds just yet! There will have to be an auction for the kit! Ha ha

[sandy6930]

Iv just been through and revised my rotation so now i can drill a cover crop between wheat snd spuds, so no luck on giving up spuds just yet! There will have to be an auction for the kit! Ha ha

You would definatly make some money on the destoner it looks a tidy bit of kit

[Guest]

Oh no  Alex looks like  me will  have to raid the pig bank   for me kit after that news  . but  it makes good reading if you keep on growing all these different crops thats for sure  - in real life i always grow a little green cover crop in me  veg garden & have being reading on a farmers site that many farms are also looking at growing cover crops same as Oakley is

[Oakley Farms]

You would definatly make some money on the destoner it looks a tidy bit of kit

Im not so sure after what i paid for it! Spuds are definatly on the agenda for the next few years, im sure i will come up with a solution to relieve compaction after harvesting, more than likely a good subsoiling and straight back in with the drill on CTF lines. I just have one thing left to work out and thats turning on headlands and how to remove/keep to a minimum, with some headlands accounting for 25% of a field it needs careful management Edited February 27, 2014 by Oakley Farms

[Light Land]

Interesting read  . A lot of big spud growers here import windrowers from the USA and put 4-8 rows up the digger at once so the trucks fill up fast and aren't going up and down the paddock many times to get a load.

[Oakley Farms]

I def think it can be done if you are running on a smaller width CTF system, i have chosen 12m to match the combine headers and also fits well with 36m tramlines, so to windrow 12 metres worth of spud rows into one is impossible unless you split it down to 6 metres and drive inbetween the 12m wheelings which in my opinion defeats the object by putting in a fresh set of wheelings, i think spuds will be a special case sanario where CTF goes out the window for a year and normal service is resumed the following year thanks to RTK Its just putting that field back right after digging/pre drilling that i want to get right or it could be a waste of time & money investing in CTF

Edited February 27, 2014 by Oakley Farms

[Oakley Farms]

Here is an insight into the build up of Oakley Farms over 25 years. Oakley Farms started out in 1989 as one of 8 farms on the Oakley Estate. Life was small to start with being dairy. 1994 saw the first change over to a mixed farm, the retirement of two tennants brought about the change with the farm swallowing up the land, machinery at this point was mixed, with two combines, a small massey & a claas dominator. 1997 saw the livestock go and the last of the tenancies given up, a turn to completly arable & potatoes was started now farming around 2000 acres, kit was was a fleet of newhollands, 7840, 8340, x2 8360's TM165 and the flagship 8970, i can remember in those days that was a massive tractor, nothing else like it in somerset, combine included a 2066 hillmaster john deere, x2 14t gull trailers, x2 12t gull trailers, at that time we still had a few of the old 10t gulls kicking about, mill till was just coming in which saw x2 rabe ploughs sold, both semi mounted a 7 furrow & a 9 furrow which i believe was the biggest plough in somerset, 1999 saw the first claas lexion arrive, a 450, very troublesome machine, only lasted a year with a 480 arriving the following. Vaderstad drills had been running on the farm for sometime, a 4 metre rapid behind the 8970. 2004 saw another change, the 8970 was swapped in for a jd 8420, vaderstad 6 metre rapid now running, at this time i was around work experience age and can remember the 8340 had changed to the futuristic looking TS135A & a brand new TM155 which i personally loved, the next few years saw tractors swapped around TS135A's seemed to be a hit. 2005 saw the complete fleet revamped, a few redundancies made due to modernisation in agriculture, x2 jd 6820's replaced 2 TS-A's, one remained & the 8420 was changed to a 8530. Combine was now a Lexion 600 with 30ft header. This pretty much brings us to the point of where the layout started, how things have changed with 2013 being a massive year of change with a new grain store and the birth of Oakley Agri Business, a comprehensive & professional contract farming business that is taking off. A joint venture between Oakley Farms and the landowner where both parties keep their own individual business identity and the crops and stock still remain the property of the landowner but Oakley provide the management expertise, labour and machinery to establish and harvest the crop. The landowner receives income from the sale of the produce but pays all variable costs and some of the fixed costs, as well as a fee to Oakley Farms that is agreed with the landowner.

Why go into a contract farming agreement with Oakley Farms?

Variable rate fertiliser application – saving £20 per hectare

Reduced storage costs

Average drying costs and rebates

Farm saved seed

Chemical policy with returns

GPS - steering reducing impact cost by minimising overlap

Marketing advantage

Overhead charges reduced

Current farm buildings can be used for diversification bringing farmer additional income

Helps with cash flow

What do we offer?

We offer a blend of contract farming services, dependent on the landowner requirements and within a specified time frame with the option to extend including:

Administration

NROSO

ACCS

Cross compliance

SFP (SPS forms)

Management accounts/reconciled

Purchasing - Oakley Farms purchases variable and fixed costs using independent companies and buying groups by purchasing in bulk to achieve the best discounts with scale. This means we can reduce costs and pass on savings to our customers

SOYL

Gatekeeper

Monthly meetings with accounts

Quarterly agreement meetings – including gross margins, rotations, varieties. These meetings are minuted

Cultivations

Mole draining

Drilling

Fertilisers

Agronomy

Combining

Grain storage – an example saving for one customer of £8 a tonne

Hedgecutting

Managed grain sales

Yield mapping

Yield maps provide variable seed/fertiliser rates

24hr Spreadsheet of yield per field

Can provide total yield and net yield after drying

Oakley Farms currently has a substantial storage capacity and is designed to manage over 1,000 tonnes a day during the harvest period and 60 tonnes an hour drying. We also have a weighbridge and sampling facilities. In 2013 Oakley Farms completed the fantastic new addition to our grain storage – the Frontier Store located on Farm. It is equipped with a Kentra dryer at the side, which can process 60 tonnes of wet grain per hour. We have incorporated a high-tech computer system which monitors, cools and aerates the grain automatically and consistently maintains the temperature <5ºC.

This grain store process includes:

The weighbridge

A grain lorry pulls onto our new Griffith-Elder Weighbridge, where the automatic CS90 Spear is waiting to take five samples

The passport is checked to make sure there is a valid accreditation sticker in the top right-hand corner and that the mycotoxin and GM Statements are clearly defined. The haulage details, signatures and dates all have to be legible so that there is a comprehensive audit trail

The operator uses a ‘wizard’ to complete the weighbridge ticket

Full details of Customer, Haulier, Contract No., Registration No., Store, Description of Goods, Delivery or Collection, Weigh Person and Driver are all clearly defined

The wizard gives prompts to make sure the information being put on the ticket is right

The weighbridge is integrated with our computer system so that the weight is immediately visible (top right hand corner) and can be added to the Weighbridge ticket, by pressing a button. This minimises the risk of human error and means weights cannot be tampered with.

Sampling

We then sample every delivery and collection using the CS90 Samplex System. This automatically takes five samples from every trailer

Using a high power suction system, the grain is sent to the reception chamber in the Weighbridge Office

The sample is then analysed by a Dickey-John GAC 2100 for moisture content, density (or bushel weight) and temperature. This machine is calibrated daily and ring tested by Frontier Laboratories

The analysis is linked to the Ton-Tel Weighbridge Management System and can be added to the Weighbridge ticket by the press of a button. Again minimising human intervention or error

As the grain is tipped into the pit, the grain store manager can either deposit dry grain into Store, or wet grain by passing it through our Kentra drying facility

Whilst this is happening, the sample (with its unique number) is bagged, labelled and stored in batches of 10. Samples for Salmonella testing are also collected for later analysis.

Unloading

We have a 48 tonne bulk out bin to unload the store quickly and easily.

Sample and paperwork storage

Once all the paperwork is finalised, the samples, passports and copies of the signed weighbridge tickets are stored in a bespoke facility with deliveries on one side and collections on the other. They will remain available until 1st July of the following year.

Drying

For monitoring temperatures, The store has three zones each containing over 20 probes

The probes monitor the temperatures every 15 minutes

Information from the probes is linked to the Robydome computer which analyses the data, recognises when the ambient ËšC and RH% are at the right levels, then automatically aerates the grain by switching the fans on

The ËšC and RH% information is used to manually switch on the aeration systems in the other zones. Manual temperature checks are carried out weekly between Harvest and Christmas, then every 10 days until the store is emptied.

With our new grainstore, we also built a dedicated grainstore office and laboratory allowing us to provide a more complete solution for our clients. When the grain arrives at Oakley Farms, the load is weighed and a sample is taken for analysis from each load. It is then tested for moisture and bushel weight. Once analysed, the laboratory determine whether the grain needs to be dryed or can be stored directly.

The Public Weighbridge is open from 7.30am to 4.00pm Monday to Friday. A long way from 1989!

[Oakley Farms]

At Oakley we also have a commitment back to the environment, planting new hedges & trees, this year we are planting a wildflower bumblebee mix around the boundries to fields, awkward shaped fields and areas unable to be reached by the sprayer etc.

The construction of our new grain store facilities gave us an opportunity to install a rainwater harvesting system. By capturing the rainwater from a section of our grain store roof we harvest sufficient volumes of water for crop spraying, washing the company’s machinery and running the farm’s toilets.

The environmental benefit of this direct re-use is that our need for mains water is greatly reduced, and this in turn results in a reduced demand on water treatment facilities, pumping & operation. When we began the development of our new grain store, we knew that we had to consider ways to reduce the costs of the energy required to run it. Our solution is to look at the installation of five ground mounted “tracking†photovoltaic panels, each one more than five metres high.These solar panels would reduce the farm’s electricity bill by around 40%, at the same time as reducing our carbon emissions. Making the storage carbon neutral & saving around £40 000 a year. Finally our baling contractor Barrow Agri has signed a deal to supply Ely power station with straw to burn for electricity, another renewable souce.

Edited March 2, 2014 by Oakley Farms

[Oakley Farms]

Smarts are in today fitting Trimble to combine 2, dave the fitter is also looking at putting Variable Rate Technology on the fert spreader & drill, now we have all fields soil mapped we can put this into place, with the drill placing more seeds per metre squared in poorer soil quality areas and less in higher areas, the same with the fertiliser, reducing some money but getting a more even crop to harvest which will help the combines, easier fungicide applications, no loging crops, improved yeild per hectare. We are unsure which route to take with fertiliser, looking at a yara N sensor or usb stick style option taken from yeild maps off the combine, thats the brilliant thing about it, seeing visable results whilst combining but backed up by a map which we can then use to improve on and benchmark for our customers.

[Barry]

Fantastic topic, getting better and better.

Wish I had you knowledge, I might be able start on my layout if I did!!!

[Oakley Farms]

Thank Barry, if it inspires others to start a layout the more the better

[tractorboyjules1977]

Keep it coming alex .looking good but still no fendts !? 

[Oakley Farms]

Keep it coming alex .looking good but still no fendts !?

No Fendts, probably my second choice, but in the model world they dont offer flexability for potatoes like the wiking john deeres i have

[tractorboyjules1977]

Ah rite . Whats the next bit of kit to arrive !!!

[Guest]

A big fat tax bill i d say  must be making loads of ££££££ on this farm       with  all this spending  but if the taxman goes easy  on Alex , id  say a big Massey Ferguson would look nice ,  fit in well lovely  with all then Greens 

[tractorboyjules1977]

b a shame to change the green ;D ;D

[0025]

omg hope its not spayed its a 75year 750!

[Oakley Farms]

There is not a lot of kit left to arrive now, only a Tong Peal Caretaker 1800 and a irrigation pipe trailer, but looking ahead to late Autumn/early spring next year will see the transformation accross to CTF, some big kit to arrive then

[sandy6930]

Can I ask who is making your pipe trailer

[Oakley Farms]

I try to spread business around and give everybody a chance, that way one person isnt bombarded with a huge list of orders to do, everyone i deal with are very helpful, its nice that friendships are formed too with the same interests

Edited March 4, 2014 by Oakley Farms

[Oakley Farms]

Spring is here at Oakley, all things go, Mark & Maurice are on hauling compost back to farm, tipping in heaps at strategic points around the land area, Joe is on spraying Round-Up ahead of cultivations for spring beans, its not quite dry enough to pull the Topdown through yet but Steve has it Hitched on and is thinking about it! It is however dry enough on top to pull the trailed fert spreader, this will help Phil cover the ground more quickly, but he is fustrated at having to travel back to the farm and use the forklift to load bags as the JCB is being used to push up compost.

[Oakley Farms]

Unfortunately i got a phone call from Phil this morning to say we had visitors during the night, on arrival its fair to say they had a field day, workshop broken into with tools gone, both diesel tanks emptied and the door handel on the Challenger broken, gained entry and smashed the Trimble screen out, not what we needed.