The current issue of the Teagasc Tillage Edge podcast is well worth a listen. The programme centres on a review of the 2022 cropping year in Ireland.
Teagasc stalwarts and all-round tillage ‘gurus’: Michael Hennessy, Shay Phelan and Ciaran Collins lead the conversation on the podcast.
They methodically review the last 12 months in tillage, emphasising both high and low points in equal measure.
But as one gets immersed in the issues under discussion, it’s hard not to be struck by the reality that Ireland’s cropping sector seems to be caught in a time warp.
Many of the advisory points made by the aforementioned Teagasc representatives would have been as relevant to my father’s generation as they are today.
A case in point is the growing threat of club root within oilseed rape crops. And what’s the answer – better rotation.
I remember well my father would never have followed swedes with cabbage or sprouts in the kitchen garden at home.
And why was this? They are all brassicas. My father did not have the opportunity to attend college. Would he have known about the specific threat of club root? I doubt it.
He was simply going on the advice he had received from his father and, no doubt the generations before him.
The need to grow crops, using effective rotations, has been known about for many years – the world over.
But, somewhere along the line, the glossy messages put out there by the big chemical companies seems to have diverted us from the fundamentals of growing crops on a sustainable basis.
Do we need to get back to basics? Of course we do.
In fact, we need to come up with crop management solutions that get us off the hook of chemical-based management systems altogether.
All of this brings me neatly round to my highlight of the tillage year that was 2022.
Back in October I was part of a group taken out to France by Lemken. On one of the farms visited, it is now standard practice to sow winter wheat with a 25cm crop spacing.
This allows for mechanical weeding to take place between the rows during the autumn and spring periods.
But here comes the twist: as the farm workers travel the fields in the spring time, they attach a seed drill to the precision hoe. This allows the establishment of a second crop within the winter wheat.
French farmers have the option of growing soya or alfalfa as a spring cropping option. However, the winter wheat will be combined before the freshly established spring crops start to make real progress.
It was all very simple, but oh so effective.