Rachel Banks, Spence Agricultural Scholar 2018

Growing up on a farm, I really enjoyed looking after the animals and the respect I learned for them. Being able to contribute to producing food is important and it was a pleasure to help my Dad, from corn carting during the harvest to opening the gates for feeding the cattle in the winter.

Farming was never pressed on me, but I have always enjoyed the outdoors and studying biology and geography, and as I have become older I have become passionate about the subject. I want to help educate people about how farms work, while also improving techniques for welfare and profit, this made studying agriculture a sensible step to take.

I chose to study at the University of Nottingham because the course had the perfect mix of academic and practical study, as well as a large emphasis on research. It also wasn’t too far from home, meaning I could easily get back if I was needed in an emergency. The campus itself is nicely located near the main university, with hopper buses to enable me to travel to the city and mingle with other students, while still being based on a lovely countryside campus surrounded by like-minded people.

The intake of new students this year was smaller than at some other agricultural universities, so I felt I would be able to better get to know my lecturers. Being top of the league tables was also good, it meant I knew I would have an advantage when it came to looking for placements or employment, which will be further assisted by the university’s links both nationally and abroad. This will be useful because I hope to take up a year in industry for my third year.

So far in my studies I have particularly enjoyed animal biology and food security. Next term I am looking forward to taking part in more specialist modules, especially grassland management, which I think will be interesting and easy to see the effects of.

My ambition for the future is to work on a farm, where I can use the knowledge and skills I’m learning at university. I also want to help others to understand the importance and practicality of agriculture, spreading the word and being involved in keeping it a world priority. If such an opportunity opens up then I am not afraid to veer away from my current career plans to follow it.

This scholarship has helped me to settle into my studies with fewer worries over finance. It has contributed to fuel for me to visit home and support my Young Farmers’ club, and to go to agricultural shows where I have been able to independently learn more about my subject. It’s also paid for trips to farms and talks with the Agricultural Society at Nottingham, which has been very interesting and useful for my degree. My area doesn’t benefit from many scholarship opportunities so I’m very grateful to have received this and have a better university experience as a result.

If you’re considering applying to the University of Nottingham or for a Spence Agricultural Scholarship then I think it’s definitely worth it. The Rochester Bridge Trust is an amazing organisation I hadn’t previously heard of and my course is a great choice if you enjoy biology and geography. It’s applicable to lots of things and can lead you into research-based or practical careers.

Rachel Banks shares some of her spring term lambing experiences.

Coming back after the winter break I was greeted with exams and new modules, followed shortly by sheep duties, giving little time to sit around.

The university’s flock of 40 lleyn cross ewes had been brought into a shed over Christmas to keep them warm and to start their tailored feed plans. As half of the ewes are owned by the Agrics Society at Nottingham, we are invited to help out with events that occur throughout the sheep calendar.

At the end of January we trimmed any of their overly long feet to prevent and treat any issues surrounding lameness, and scanned them with a portable ultrasound. The sheep also received an injection (heptavac) to prevent clostridal diseases.

The ewes were then all placed on a diet fit for themselves and the lambs they were carrying. As there are only 40 sheep and they were not separated by how many lambs were due, they all received enough food for twins. This consisted of barley and oats as concentrates, haylage as a sweeter grass alternative, and sugar beet from the farm. The students undertaking an enterprise management module in second year are responsible for their feed plan alongside the farm manager.

In the UK lambing time varies depending on location, if a farmer wants more people available for work experience, and also when holidays/ optimum market take place. It can be as early as December or as late as June in some areas (more typically around March/April). The Nottingham ewes were put in with rams in the autumn around October, in two sets, so the ewes had two different due dates, at the beginning of March and and the end of March (145 days later). The first lambs from those ewes were born in the first week in March.

As I am writing this, we have two ewes left to lamb out of the group, with all the lambed ewes now out in the field with their respective lambs. Some of the first-time ewes need a little assistance with lambing, which is one of the reasons they are brought indoors. We also check them regularly during the day and some farmers also check their flocks at night, and as a result, this time of year is very busy!

I have helped lamb two ewes this year who were struggling, as well as working to get the lambs ready to go out to the fields. This involves giving them a spray of iodine and some probiotics when they are born to dry up the umbilical cord (to stop nasties) and give them a natural boost. After a few days (or a day if they are doing well) we spray the ewe’s number on both the lamb and the ewe to help identify them when mixed, and we ring the tail to dock it a little shorter (so that when they are older they are less likely to get flystrike). The ewes are also given wormer before getting turned out in good weather.

Occasionally it is possible or necessary to adopt a lamb across to another ewe. There are many reasons for doing this. One reason is that the ewe dies at some point after delivering her lambs, which fortunately has not happened to our flock this year. Another is because the ewe rejects her lamb(s) so it needs milk from a reliable source, which is when a suitable ewe can be chosen. Similarly, if a ewe has triplets or even quads, she will not produce enough milk to keep them very healthy, so, where possible, moving a lamb onto a ewe who has only one lamb is desirable.

When adopting a lamb over, time and smell are both very important as the ewe bonds to her newborns based on scent. We successfully moved a lamb from a triplet ewe onto a single ewe, as they had lambed at the same time, and once it was born it was rubbed in the new ewes placenta and afterbirth to make it smell like her own, before being placed with its new sibling for her to lick.

Thankfully the ewes should be done lambing before my Easter break, so there will be less worry and more time to focus on the exams approaching in late May/June.

The end of my first year at university was 21 June, celebrated with the Summer Ball and our exam results being released. I was happy to see I had passed all my modules, doing even better in some of the harder exams than I thought! I then had the privilege of enjoying the glorious sunshine with all my friends at the ball, with fairground rides, tasty food and performances from S-Club 3 and DJs through the night. I even made it to the survivors’ photo and a much-needed bacon butty at 6am. 

The next few days involved packing up all my belongings and getting ready to move out of my accommodation. While taking down all the photos that have gathered on the walls throughout the year and boxing up all my kitchen things to move over, I appreciated how welcoming the university has been; from setting us up with welcome boxes and introducing us to tutors in the first week, to providing us with exam support and coursework feedback. The socials organised by the Guild and societies have brought lots of fun throughout the year too. 

Some highlights of the year for me have definitely been going to the DairyTec show with the university to look around and talk to people about the courses, looking after the Agrics sheep flock and the summer ball. 

I have enjoyed joining societies at the university such as the Agrics society which gets me invloved in talks, farm visits and socials with vets, agriculture students and more who all appreciate the outdoors and farming lifestyles. I am also a member of the Farmers Market Society which gives me discounts at the monthly farmers markets held on the campus and member bonuses. Being invloved in these societies has given me a wider range of friends and has definitely enriched my university experience over the year.

Over the summer I am helping the university on open days and I’m looking forward to showing my enthusiasm for the university. I am also working on my home farm helping to make hay for our cattle, then for harvest on the arable side. 

I am looking forward to spending some time at home before heading back for an exciting second year.

Since the last blog at the end of June, a lot of time has passed and a lot has happened. I worked full time for the first time over the summer, having the delightful 7.30am start with variable finish times for the whole two and a bit months. My job was on my home farm, as a labourer or farm worker over the harvest period. It was a very busy time of year for the home farm, with hay and silage making at the start of June leading into July for harvest. The home farm is made up of about 1,000 acres and we have both cattle and crops across South Cambridgeshire.

Hay is typically made when mature grass is cut and left to dry out, before being gathered up into condensed bales. As a result it requires a few good dry days, which were few and far between this season. It can also be relatively labour-intensive, turning the grass over to dry evenly with a tractor in the heat. It will come as no surprise that we chose not to put as much energy into hay making this year, and a lot of our grass went into silage. 

Unlike hay, silage can be a lot wetter when cut as it has a different system to preserve it. Where with hay you dry it out to make it inhospitable for microorganisms such as mould, silage gets wrapped up in a thick film to isolate it from any bad microorganisms getting in. This method also creates a fermentation process without oxygen present, and essentially turns the grass into a softer and sweeter food. You can see most silage in little round or square bales in fields, or often more towards the dairying side of farming, in “clamps” where large quantities of fresh grass and other forage (this can include maize or clover etc) are compressed in large pits and covered over.

This year we made a lot of silage in pink wrap, in support of breast cancer research. All the silage and hay will help feed our cattle and some local horses for the winter. I found that this work is highly enjoyable as the rake which I was in charge of, was relatively fast paced and satisfying. I had a challenge of getting through lots of small gates with the tractor and rake, but learnt a lot and surprisingly didn’t break anything!

Any free time at work was then spent sweeping, vacuuming, and disinfecting the dormant grain sheds ready for the influx of grains, beans and peas. It was hot work with a dust mask for my protection and no music to listen to over the vacuum, but important for the biosecurity of the food. I would also walk through the fields pulling out weeds that had survived any previous attempts to thwart them, before they could seed and produce more stubborn children. You were never standing still for long, with plenty jobs just waiting to be tackled during a quiet moment. 

Soon, on the other side of the business, the barley became ready. It is important for us to harvest crops when they are at a specific moisture and condition for their job. This particular barley was grown for malting, so that it could go into foods such as bread and drinks such as beer. It also needs specific nitrogen content and other criteria for it to be sold in the food market. As a result we have lots of visitors over the summer sampling everything. 

As the barley was ready, it was time to start the combine’s engine, give it a once over and get ready to escort it along the working roads. Unlike a car or even most tractors, the combine is a formidable machine. It is over 4m wide, which takes up well more than half of the road, and weighs more than 17 tonnes empty. It can go 30km/h top speed on the roads which is around 20mph. Our model is nothing particularly large or fancy for its job, and there are lots smaller and bigger. Due to its size there had been one job I did not want over summer; escorting.

Unfortunately not all of our fields are accessible through other fields, and we do need to move it as efficiently as possible on the roads. The farm land rover is equipped with an amber flashing beacon on the roof and an attachable sign that reads “WIDE VEHICLE FOLLOWING”. This car then scouts ahead of the combine, identifying areas where cars will not be able to pull over in, and thus waiting at areas where they can, so the drivers need not reverse or put themselves in danger. Strangely enough though, some drivers seem to read this as “irritating driver within, please ignore and continue aimlessly” sign. It is again no surprise I dislike this job, but it is necessary for everyone to be safe and for us to get off the roads again as quickly as possible. 

It is also worth mentioning that the combine has relatively poor hind visibility. It has no mirror that looks directly behind and therefore cannot see behind. This makes reversing unfavored and another reason why the combine cannot manoeuvre out of the way easily, both from safety and practicality points of view. We had only two occasions where angry drivers over the summer told the combine to move out the way, thankfully. To my delight I was only entrusted with escorting short distances, and on the less troubling journeys, reducing my stress levels a little. The barley that was ready was soon all in our sheds in a matter of days, and some sold soon after. 

Conveniently the farm had two weeks off from combining as everything else wasn’t quite ready. I took a few days out to help at university open days, and went on a short holiday with some friends. It didn’t seem like long before the rest of the barley was ready, followed by the wheat, peas and beans. 

This was the busiest period of work, with my record working day stretching from 7.30am to 11.30pm that night. It’s not uncommon for some farms up and down the country to keep going while they can – until 3 or 4am. Our farm is lucky enough to have a more relaxed approach this year, with my father and Jack, who works full time, only going past midnight combing once this year, the day before rain was forecast. 

I was on a tractor with a big 14 tonne yellow trailer, watching the combine from the side until it was nearly full (as signalled by its flashing lights). I would then drive alongside the combine and its spout would turn out. As both of us drove along the grain would fall from the spout into my trailer, and I would be careful to keep it filling up evenly, and slightly from the back, so that it would fill up back end first and I could then see the grain fall for the front half. It has taken lots of years of practice and I am still not perfect, but maybe I will be a wizard at it by 60! 

Wheat is the UK’s biggest crop produced, and the third most in the world, behind rice and maize. It is an important source of energy and relatively easy to grow on the soils found here. There are lots of places it can grow, doing especially well in the fenlands around North East Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire. It struggles anywhere particularly cold or really wet, which is why it is less common in the north and west of the UK. 

There is also the matter of getting to it. The steep hills away from the east are not welcoming to the big machinery needed to grow wheat, and so such land is better devoted to grass which can be converted into energy by ruminants such as cows and sheep. It is also a nutrient-demanding crop, needing lots of added nutrients and minerals like nitrogen to grow properly. That is why farmers don’t grow it every year, so the soil can have a break. We use barley, beans and peas for this. It is very common to use oil seed rape and sugar beet as break crops too. The peas we grow are harvested dry and can go into human foods as protein, as canned peas and in our case, a lot to the animal feed industry, including dog food. The beans have a similar role as a protein source too.

After the biggest chunk of harvesting was out the way, some of us started the next jobs on those fields, including cultivating, ploughing and discing. These jobs essentially help break up the soil ready for the next seeds. There is a lot of research in this area at the moment in farming, looking at how much you should be driving on the soil, how much if at all should you break it up and when should you do anything. As a result most farmers have a different approach based off individual soil and machinery qualities, as well as preference. We also used this time to spread compost and our own cattle manure from over winter onto some fields to recycle the nutrients and boost the soil. We also have the choice between making rows from the plant stalks which we bale, or chopping them in the combine and spreading it as it goes. We had targeted fields where the straw was being reincorporated into the soil, and some where little straw bales were later made ready to sell or store for the cattle’s bed in winter.

We celebrated the end of harvest on our only bean field for the year, by which point, most of the other fields had already been churned up, a lot of the wheat and barely already sold and taken away, and a neat stack of bales in the sheds or on corners of fields for collecting. Over the harvest we only had 3 tires burst, a couple small spillages, and lots and lots of packed dinners sent out by my grandma. On one day we had 6 lorries one after another to collect wheat, and 5 another day. All with the correct feed passports and a big red tractor assurance sticker. That proved our farm had met extra standards of traceability, sustainability, responsibility and being British. 

Somehow in that hectic summer we also took down a shed, cleaned all the metal girders, repainted them to stop rust, and put in foundations for it to go up elsewhere. My dad and I constructed a bale wrap holder to go on the front of a tractor, and fitted water, gas and electric to a static caravan. I cleaned the 4 tractors, 1 combine and 1 telehandler more times than I could count, inside too! We had a TB Test with our cattle on the hottest day of the year (37*C) in the morning and a big mechanic breakdown during combining that same afternoon. I pressure washed an entire cattle shed and disinfected it, pulled thistles from a field and even helped the council look at drainage for a day. Some days I would be sat in a tractor seat for almost 15 hrs (with breaks of course!), and other days I wouldn’t even stand still yet alone sit. Some days I would come back and go straight to bed, and others I still made time to go to the pub with my friends. It was one of the most exhausting, varied, and unpredictable jobs I could ever have. I would’t ever change it for anything.

I have had a busy few weeks, with exams and farm matters arising at home.

Back in January I returned to university after a Christmas break, completing my exams for the Autumn Semester. Lambing then fast approached, which I discussed in more detail last year in my spring blog. I took a larger role within the herd this year, checking with the sheep manager each evening and between lectures, so those weeks went quickly and soon we were approaching mid-March. 

I heard news from a fellowship in the USA with the University of Georgia, that I had been successful in my application, and I would be jetting off to America in April! Alongside coursework being set and logistics of fitting extra-curricular events beside work, I miraculously kept on top of work and soon it was two weeks before the end of our spring term and the beginning of Easter Break. 

Pandemic

By this point news of the seriousness of covid-19 had spread around the country, and several worried parents were checking on students as we were still at university. Plans for socialising were vamping up in anticipation of our long Easter break, which were suddenly brought to a halt with the university’s decision to move learning online. We had a week of transition to online learning before requests from the university for us to move home where possible were sent. 

With two sheep left to lamb, I stayed till the end of the week helping tie up loose ends there, in particular allocating the sheep to staff who could remain on site to look after them. By the weekend I had moved all my items out of my student house and into my very cramped car. 

By the next weekend all the pubs had shut, and lockdown began. From then on I have been working on all coursework at home (perhaps more so than without lockdown) and running house errands such as shopping for the house as I have two parents who work full time in the food industry. 

It has been interesting to live in a house with five out of six of us home. My sisters Millie and Emma are year 13 and 11 at school/ sixth form, so with exams cancelled they have been embracing the garden and television, as well as lie ins. My other sister Hannah is in year 10, so still has all her GCSE work to complete, which her school has been very on top of, sending lots of her usual work and checking up once a week on the phone. My mother, as mentioned, is working full time at home, managing her company’s response to covid-19 alongside her usual jobs, so the house is full of online conference calls and the kitchen table is covered with laptops, computers and paper for all three of us doing work. 

Family farm

My father runs our family farm, which I worked on last summer and will be doing so again. The farm has been facing its own challenges outside of the global pandemic. We have been calving since March, and so the time came to put the cows out to pasture with the good weather, and to meet the bull again. Temptation, as he is known, has been our only bull on the farm for five years, producing more than a hundred beautiful calves and he has become a favourite on the farm with his calm temperament and good nature. This year we also purchased a new bull, from the same breeder as Temptation, so that we could keep Temptation’s daughters to breed with. His name is Dave, and has been happily relaxing with his group of heifers (a cow that has not yet had a calf) on the other side of the village. 

As with any farm, unforeseeable accidents occur, and Temptation managed to injure himself one night, leaving him immobile for a few days. We brought him food and water, as well as painkillers to help him recover, aware that the cows were starting to come into heat. This is where the cow’s fertility cycle indicates she is ready for mating with a bull (or artificial insemination in some farms). A small group of cows had began ‘bulling’ where they start rubbing and jumping on each other to find a bull. 

Temptation did begin to get a little better. By the end of the first week he could stand up when I brought him silage, which is a sweet preserved form of grass, and by the second week he would walk about 50m a day to try and keep up with the herd. We had made the field smaller for his ease. This progress was still not enough for him to do his job, meaning the farm was put in a difficult position:

• We did not know how many cows he had served, but it had not been all of them. The longer he was out of action, the more cycles would be missed by the cows, putting their due date gap a month later. This also meant artificial insemination was out of the question.
• We had no way to move Temptation out, as a 1.5 Tonne bull is difficult to move in his state, and we were hopeful his condition would improve. Even if we did manage to load him onto a trailer, we had no one to replace him.
• Although we now had Dave, he had his own girls to manage, so would not be able to move. We could not merge the herds as the fields are too small and it would overwhelm Dave.
• We all loved Temptation so didn’t want him to go. The longer he was here recovering the more muscle mass he lost due to his injury and he lost condition, therefore making it harder for him to get up again.

By the end of the third week, the farm had begun to look at replacement bulls, as it would be the only way for the cows to continue making money next year. The breeder which had provided us with Dave and Temptation had one bull left, Eric, who we had seen when picking out Dave. The decision was made to retire Temptation to the abattoir, where his carcass could have some purpose, and they had the facilities to handle a 1.5tonne carcass. 

The breeder kindly dropped Eric off the afternoon after Temptation had left, and we know although it was sad to say goodbye to Temptation, he was still in pain after a large recovery window and would probably never have fully recovered. Eric is now settled in with a big task to get to know the herd of cows with their calves, and will hopefully stay on the farm for many years to come with Dave.

Hard choices

It is important to remember the hard choices any farm makes throughout the year, whether it be debating when to sell grain to get a profit, or when to retire a much-loved farm animal. There are always silver linings, in our bulls’ case, Eric and Dave used to be pen mates at their old home, so where we were worried over how to keep two bulls over winter, we now have the possibility of keeping them together as they are already friends. Cows make friends like people, which was clear by the sight of the same cows staying near Temptation during his injury. Eric’s arrival has created a large amount of interest among the herd, and he already has a small collection of calves who flock to him all day. 

The farm is now beginning to cut grass to make silage for the winter feed supply for the cattle. The barns are getting cleaned for harvest and work will soon become the classic hectic harvest each year. I have one online exam to complete and then I am free from university for a year, as I will be completing a placement year in industry with Bayer CropScience.

Remember to keep smiling! And look forward to the good things that can come out of bad situations, like I have been doing this week with our bull fiasco.

This summer I have been working on the farm, similarly to last year which I spoke about in my big harvest blog. 

Covid-19 has not changed too much about my summer job, as I was working with family and people who live on site, and a lot of work is in well ventilated spaces or alone in a tractor. Due to the heavy rain the country experienced this winter, many farmers didn’t plant what they had planned, and the heatwave in April caused a lot of the yields across the country to fall.

A good example is our hard peas, which get processed for dog food and baby food, and normally would yield more than four tonnes per hectare. This year it barely reached two tonnes per hectare. This large shortfall will be felt across the country in due time, and with many people being encouraged to eat local the news that we will need to import wheat and other staples to up our stocks has come at a bad time. On the positive side, we did not struggle to find shed space this year, as like many farms across the country we do not have enough space to hold everything we combine. Once we have enough wheat in our temporary sheds, we are visited by near constant lorries to help take them on their way. The last crops to cut were the beans, so with harvest wrapped up I am looking at what I will hopefully be doing in the coming months. 

On 1st September I will be starting a year’s placement as part of my degree in industry. For myself, I managed to get a great placement with Bayer CropScience, which is based in Cambridge. I will be on their Crop Trials farm and will be doing a lot of work to keep those trials going. They are one of the leading pesticide developers in the world and I will be working with many of their products so I have already begun training to ensure I am qualified and confident doing jobs on the site. PA1, is a qualification for the safe handling and application of pesticides, and is an important precursor before getting qualified to use the application equipment, which due to the Covid-19 situation, has been agreed I can train to use once I start. Similarly to working at home, the outdoor nature and small work team involved on the farm have led to little changes to the planned year so far.

I have also been lucky enough to get the opportunity to take my Telescopic Fork Lift Truck licence this summer, which I combined with a visit to a good university friend. Having not seen each other since March it was lovely to spend four days doing the training and test with her. The training was an intense two days of learning the legislation, operation and maintenance surrounding these very important machines. Safety being the most important takeaway. This means I am now much more confident going into placement, as well as the bonus that I can drive a telehandler. 

It is vitally important that people are properly trained on farms, as they can be dangerous workplaces with complex technology. The rate of farm fatalities is 18 times higher than the rest of industry and although it is slowly coming down it is still incredibly high. This year alone four people on farms died working at height in the UK, from fragile rooves and Telescopic handlers, and seven from being struck by a moving vehicle (again including telescopic handlers) bringing home the importance of why you must know how to drive them, and reminding people why the law requiring a licence to drive one exists.

Farm Safety Week went into its eighth year this summer, taking a week to stress the importance of farm safety, releasing helpful videos, parent advice and stressing the importance of taking care. Apps like What 3 Words have received praise from the farming communities as they help locate people across the globe to a 3M square. This is great if you need assistance in a field, from fellow farmers or the emergency services.

Thankfully, we seem to be heading in the right direction for safety across the UK and Ireland, and so the future, both near and distant seem brighter. Next years’ crops are going in the ground, which is already a better sign than last year, countries are grasping how to manage a dangerous virus, and I have a fantastic placement to look forward to. The fellowship I had been granted to visit the US has been postponed rather than cancelled, and I think all across the globe progress is happening in some way or another.

The last few months on my placement at Bayer CropScience seem to have flown by! I have seen pretty much all types of weather, from -5°C freezing wind and snow to 23°C warm and sunny. I have gone through another lockdown at work, spent some time working at home and also had busy days in the field. The biggest change this spring, however, was learning to use the large variety of vehicles and implements on the farm.

Starting off the year we had a large delivery of 3,000 hedging plants to plant around the farm. The purpose of planting new hedges is to provide a habitat and food for birds, insects and small mammals. This in turn helps pollinate the fields, keeps the fields full of life and supports the buzzards, barn owls and other predators in the local area.

The hedge will also provide a wind break and create a barrier to stop trespassers and disease transfer. These hedges are not cheap to put in, but are worthwhile in the long run, especially when choosing varieties that are suitable to the local nature and soil.

With one member of the farm team shielding, we had a lot of ground to cover as a group of three. The ground itself required a lot of prep, cutting down any vegetation with a flail mower, then rolling out the biodegradable matting, which we pegged down before moving over it with the spades and planting.

With six different hedge varieties, we had to keep to a pattern to evenly distribute them, and then follow behind with canes and spirals to prevent herbivore damage. This work was done during those first hard frosts and snow, so the ground was initially very solid for the first few lengths. With some additional help from other members of the field solutions team, we managed to get it all in within two weeks, and it’s now starting to get green and even flower.

Not too long after, we started preparing the ground for spring drilling. This gave me an opportunity to use my newly acquired PA2 qualification, which is for the safe use of pesticides on a tractor sprayer.

Because a lot of the land had been too wet to drill (plant seeds), a large area on one site had been left over the winter. This is not ideal as it can lead to soil erosion, damage the soil structure and cause loss of nutrients in the soil. It also leads to a lot of weeds, so we needed to kill the plants on the ground before working the soil to get the seedbed ready for planting again.

Using a broad-spectrum herbicide, which is a chemical that targets all plants, I carefully read the instructions to calculate the correct dosage of concentrate and water before spraying. The weather, general ground conditions and safety issues also need to be considered. When handling pesticides the correct PPE must be worn; you cannot spray pesticides near watercourses, drains or other vulnerable areas; and you must spray in correct weather conditions so as to not cause overlap from drift or wind, and to ensure the efficacy of the pesticide is as high as possible. The sprayer itself is regularly calibrated and uses GPS so that I do not overlap areas. Once sprayed, the active ingredients in the pesticide only last a while in the ground before becoming harmless, so after this point we cultivate the ground again and drill the next crop.

This time of the year the farm at Bayer plants a lot of spring cereals (wheat, rye, etc) as well as veg. I have been taught how to use the veg drill, which has four rows, and a gear system with interchangeable discs to change between the different veg types. I began on sugar beet, drilling five large trials on both farms. This was a fun job, as it requires a lot of concentration and planning, but the tractor used is a little compact with no cab, so it is fairly loud with no radio or aircon (which can make it a little tedious!).

Trials work is very different to conventional farming. Before I can even think about putting the drill on the tractor, the farm team needs to know how many seeds to order, and how large the trials are, as well as how to fit them all in.

To avoid compaction and crop damage, like most conventional farms we have tramlines that go up and down the field. These are where the tractors drive once the crop is drilled to prevent trampling and to prevent overlap of products like fertiliser.

At Bayer’s farm, all their equipment can keep to 12M tramlines. This means that everything goes up in squares of three. Before the crops are in the ground, we use the 3M and 6M wide equipment so that they always make it to the tramlines, and once the crop is in only 12M wide equipment goes on. It is all a lot to get your head around, but makes more sense when you are out there.

The drill is then checked, making sure it is in the appropriate gear (which controls how fast the discs with seed spin, thus altering the gap between seeds) and has the right discs (these have holes which hold the seed, so the right size is needed). Once it’s all ready I head out with the plan and get the GPS ready for my first run.

It is important to prime the drill, so that the seed is ready in the discs. You do this by spinning the wheel, which makes everything else turn, until you see seeds begin to drop out. I then engage the drill in the ground with the GPS on and head up and down the planned length.

When seed is changed, due either to a seed treatment specific trial, or at the end of the trial, the remaining seed in the drill is hoovered out, and you prime the drill until it is running nothing out, before loading the next seed in (or pack up for the night). I have also now drilled onions, leeks and carrots on the veg drill, and am happy to go out and do work on my own with it, as well as handle all the technicalities of changing over the drill.

While crops are growing, they require nitrogen and other minerals and elements to grow and stay healthy. Like all living things, plants use ATP (phosphate) for cellular functions and nitrogen (+ sulphur) for making proteins and enzymes.

Whereas humans and animals obtain these from eating other organisms, plants use their roots to take these up from the ground. To ensure they have enough for producing high yields, farmers put additional nutrients into the ground.

Nitrogen is the most frequently put on, and I have been learning to use the fertiliser spreader to apply nitrogen, in the form of ammonium nitrate, onto the crops and seedbeds. The amount applied is calculated depending on the crop, soil type of the land and a rough idea of what is already there. It is a waste of money to put too much fertiliser on the ground, and many Nitrogen Vulnerable Zones (NVZs) exist which also limit how much you can put on.

The fertiliser is put on in stages, so that it is available when needed. This is normally just as the seed is germinating and beginning to grow, then twice or three times later at key growth stages. Farmers and agronomists go through a lot of training to understand different crop growth stages, as well as the science behind what they are putting on so that they can make the most economical and environmentally-sensitive decisions. This applies to fertilisers (natural or synthetic), chemicals and other things, like additional soil.

Agronomists have qualifications that show they have good knowledge on how plants grow and their environments. These qualifications only stand if they attend events and learning groups to keep up to date with the latest advancements – and refresh their memory – so that they can advise farmers appropriately.

The spring has been busy on my placement at Bayer Crop Science, I have had some great opportunities to get stuck in with the trials, and improve my knowledge of the crops and weeds from field walking and discussing plant growth stages.

The main event over the last few months has been the potatoes, from getting the land ready, planting the potatoes and setting up the watering system. I would suggest that as a team the work has taken more than two full weeks’ worth of working hours spread over the last few months, so this has by far been the largest single project I have helped undertake this year. 

Preparations began in the winter when I was on the tractor and chisel plough. The chisel plough works by pulling a series of wedges under the ground to lift the soil and break it up into large chunks. As the land would be going into potato ridges, the soil needs to be loose and “free-ed up” as much as possible before a ridge former comes in. My colleague Josh and I worked together to ensure that the chisel plough had passed over the field in three different directions to ensure maximum lift in the soil. With contractors responsible for creating the ridges with specialist ridge formers and stone removers, it was only a matter of calling them when the weather was suitable so they could make the perfect potato beds ready for planting. Other preparations carried out well beforehand included switching the tyres on the CLAAS tractor from standard tyres to thinner row-crop tyres that are thin enough to fit between the ridges without squashing the beds at all.

The planter was the next piece of kit set to travel over the land, so the potato tubers were ordered ready, and when they arrived they needed to be stored in the dark and cool so as not to sprout or turn green before going into the ground. The planter was new to the farm this year, and so getting used to settings took a little time, and the various differing timings of planting for the trials allowed us to set it up properly on the shorter sections of planting. Potatoes sit in the hopper at the top, and are fed through on little cups and then dropped into gaps the planter forms in the ground, before being covered up by a series of metal pieces. The spacing of the potatoes can be adjusted with the speed of the cups moving, and it uses a wheel on the ground to determine how fast it is covering ground.

I was sent out with Josh to plant the second lot of spuds, which made up the majority of trials, with three different varieties and different layouts we had to follow. Josh sat in the tractor and I walked alongside for the whole day, checking they were all going in correctly and that the trickle irrigation tape – which is fed through the planter so that it lies within the ridges – is all installed correctly and cut and tied at the ends. I managed at least 27,000 steps in the day and worked later than normal to get them all in. It was one of the most intense and enjoyable days I have had, with a lot of responsibility and problem solving as it did not go smoothly the whole time. The next day consisted of tidying up the ends where the finish on the beds was less consistent or we had issues the previous day and needed to join up sections of tape etc. 

The irrigation used on the potatoes has both overhead sprinklers and in-bed trickle tape. This is to maximise the amount of humidity and moisture present to encourage a disease called late blight for trials. It took several afternoons and days to get all the pipework laid out for the irrigation, as well as to check it was all working with minimal leaks and loss to pressure. One of the winter jobs had been to construct all of the new pipework together and do a full stock take in preparation. The two pump houses that control the system needed looking at and setting up by a professional to keep the system within regulations and make sure it is working correctly. Both of these are now working properly and on a hot day it is lovely to run under the sprays of water (when you aren’t trying to fix breaks or blockages in the pipework). Another way that conditions for blight are optimised is through growing maize around the potatoes to separate trials and stop wind. This increases humidity again. 

The potatoes themselves take a lot of nutrients out of the soil so to keep them growing well and to replace the nutrients they take up, fertiliser is applied onto the beds. I spent an entire day ensuring the correct amounts of different nutrients were applied with the fertiliser spreader. The nutrients included nitrogen, potash, magnesium, sulphur and phosphate, all at different rates. The spreader needed emptying and re-calibrating between uses so this was another long day, made a lot quicker as I had calculated the amounts needed and the rates beforehand. The sprayer also passed over the beds to keep weed pressure down as the potatoes emerged. Because of the spacing of the beds, and the fact you are restricted to only running in the dips between the beds, calculating the route so you don’t miss sections or over-spray is very important. Once the potato planter and fertiliser spreader had been finished with, I thoroughly washed, cleaned and greased them so they do not get rusty or seize up when not in use. 

Later in the season, the trials will develop and data will be collected, then the potatoes will be harvested, and the whole process will begin on another field. Although I may not be with Bayer come harvest, I have still been able to enjoy the process of looking after this crop that I previously had no experience with, and will continue to enjoy it even when things go wrong!

Working at Bayer on my placement year was an incredible opportunity I am grateful to have been given, but come September it was time for me to head back to Nottingham to finish my studies. I had a lot planned to keep me busy in the new academic year, as I had decided to step up to the committee for the Botanical Society, as well as becoming the Vice Chair for the Student Union Guild.

Even while I was in my last few weeks of placement, I was busy working with the new guild committee to organise all the welcome week activities for the new students. This involved a lot of last-minute event forms, and working out how things will work since the relaxation of Covid-19 restrictions. The week was a success and I didn’t have any time to miss being at home or work. Since then I have organised the alumni formal dinner and begun planning for the Society ball and festival in the new year.

After the chaos of the first two welcome weeks, my new modules started and I enjoyed getting back to academic life. I had three modules this term, which are all coursework based. Some involved team work, some involved self-study and I have a few essays to get completed before Christmas. I also have my dissertation to work on.

I collected data during my placement year, but I have chosen to work alongside one of the PhD students and use some of their data looking at the canopy structure in sugar beet and how that impacts the amount of light it absorbs. The project has really inspired me about research work and I am even considering doing a PhD after I graduate.

Looking into potential PhDs has definitely made me try to narrow down my interests and think about what I want to do in the future. I do think I will work within the R&D sector after enjoying my placement year so much, and I have developed a keener interest in plant health and agronomy which I will pursue. After updating my CV and writing my personal statements, I have applied to some PhD opportunities looking at plant diseases in the UK, as well as keeping an eye on graduate programmes and work opportunities for after uni.

With Botanical Society I have organised some events involving a popular plant swap, and as usual I have been seen in the pub with the Agrics society and out and about with the uni sheep flock. The CropTec show, which is normally a highlight of the year, went ahead and I had a fab day walking around the stands, talking to industry professionals and attending seminars on plant health and new technologies. I managed to squeeze in a few hours working on the university farm, as well as plenty of walks in the Peaks at the weekends.

I am looking forward to the remainder of the year, having fun with friends and finishing my studies before I move onto the next phase in my life, whatever that may be!

A few years back, before Christmas in 2019, I applied to go on a fellowship to the US to look at agriculture practices over the pond. With Covid among other reasons, the trip was postponed to April 2022, when myself and nine others all met in the airport and flew over to the peach state of Georgia. The trip was hosted by The University of Georgia (UGA) and the American Embassy in London.

The trip was incredible, and I learnt so much about different farming practices. For starters, the increased temperatures found in the southern state are not best suited for the grasses we find in the UK, so they have a lot of Bermuda grass rather than ryegrasses. I had never heard of the grass species before, it looks very similar but becomes dormant easily to protect itself (and so goes brown) but is incredibly heat tolerant. Many of the farms I visited were dairy or beef units so this was a common sight on our travels.

The grass was not actually the first surprise when I flew over to the US. As I descended from the eight-hour flight, the ground was absolutely covered in trees! This was not what I was expecting from the self proclaimed ‘peach state’ in the south of the large country. Our guide, John, a recently retired professor with the University of Georgia, explained that Georgia has five main agricultural exports, all of which began with P. They are also the number one state in the country producing blueberries and spring onions (more on onions later!).

Poultry

It’s no surprise that Americans value the chicken industry, as they consume more than any other nation in the world, with more than 9.2 billion broiler chickens produced in 2021 (National Chicken Council, 2021) making them the largest producers in the world. In fact, if the State of Georgia were to become independent, it would still be the eighth largest broiler producer worldwide. I visited GPLN (Georgia Poultry Laboratory Network), where they have large plans in place to protect their birds and the industry from the rising risk of avian influenza. Obviously this trip was followed up with lunch at the very southern ‘Chick-Fil-A’. Eggs rank as the state’s third most important commodity by value (Farm Bureau GA, 2022).

Peanuts

This tasty product is produced from a legume, and is not actually a nut as it sounds. They are a brilliant crop to reintroduce nitrogen naturally into the soil, as legumes fix atmospheric nitrogen. In the more cultural side of my visit, I got to go to a UGA baseball game, where these were a common snack you could buy, and still in the shells. Peanut bars, Peanut flavoured chocolate and just salted peanuts were available in almost every shop we visited, and although there weren’t any in the ground you could see its importance with almost 1.5 billion kilograms produced in 2020 (Farm Bureau GA, 2022).

Pecans

Now this one is an actual nut, and one that was in a lot of desserts. Pecan pie, pecan cake or just pecans on their own. These trees are scattered across the state and they have enough to be the largest national producer. I definitely enjoyed all the sweet treats you can apparently make with the pecan nut, regardless of if you call it a “pea-can” or a “pea-cawn” (We had various lessons about the rights and wrongs of this!)

Peaches

Although they are not the largest producer of peaches nationally (that award now goes to California (Agricultural Marketing Resource Center, 2022.) The state’s warm climate and beautiful soils help produce naturally sweet peaches, and they are still the status fruit of the state, found on all the GA numberplates and being at the heart of a lot of Georgia media campaigns.

Pine Trees

This last one strays a little out of agriculture, and into agroforestry. As I mentioned earlier, the state is absolutely covered in forests and trees, and is the top wood fuel exporter globally (Georgia Forestry Commission). Sustainability for the sector is essential, and annually they grow 64% more trees than are harvested. A lot of the exports of the timber (as well the other industries like poultry and peanuts) find their way to the Georgia Ports Authority in Savannah and from there are shipped globally. The port is the largest in the US, and I was lucky enough to have a tour, learning about the logistics, changing habits after the pandemic and the economic decisions behind everything that goes on at the port.

Finally

Georgia is also very proud of its Vidalia onions, which when grown in the rich soils develop a very sweet taste that can’t be achieved through variety alone. The growing, sorting and storing systems are very similar to the UK for onions, and it was both unexpected but nice to hear shared concerned over labour, albeit their primary work force was typically brough up from South American countries like Mexico.

The trip provided a thorough experience of the southern hospitality of Georgia, and I feel I could go on for hours if I went into the cattle (and their accommodation, where a lot have water sprinklers installed in their sheds to keep temperatures down), the cotton (gins are not full of alcohol I have learnt), and US/UK trade policy, which we all learnt about too.

My main takeaway was that agriculture is ingrained in the southern culture, and the farmers are incredibly proud of providing healthy and sustainable food. Standards may be slightly different but both countries use science to reinforce decision-making and we could learn something about their integration of agriculture and education to influence the public perception of agriculture, for better and worse.