Edwin Taylor — South Northumberland

Fifth-generation mixed farmer and founding BASE-UK member who transitioned from conventional to conservation agriculture over 20+ years, documenting the gradual evolution from min-till through to near-total no-till. From Direct Driller Issue 9.

📰 Read articles by Edwin Taylor — South Northumberland on Direct Driller → View author archive

Profile
Location South Northumberland
Arable 806 ha
Grassland 285 ha + woodland
Altitude 20–300m (farm sits at 220m)
Soils Sandy silty loam; high magnesium levels
Rainfall 750mm average
Livestock 150 suckler cows + followers
Drills Disc and tine drill (both, for flexibility)

Transition Timeline

Period Action
Early 1990s Ceased 200-cow dairy herd; focus shifted to combinable crops
Late 1990s Moved to “min-till” — initially focused on cost reduction and work rates
Early 2000s Recognised damage from heavy cultivation; shifted to scratch tillage with soil health focus
2006 First cover crop — simple oat/mustard mix; spring beans no-tilled (not fully successful)
2008 Extremely wet autumn; virtually no winter crop drilled — “penny dropped” on need for wider rotation
2009 Proved spring crops could work; continued experimenting with covers and direct drilling
Nov 2012 Light bulb moment: attended meeting at Newark; heard Frederic Thomas speak; joined BASE-UK from founding; committed to near-total no-till
2012 onwards Only winter cereals that established were on fields not inverted since late 1990s with straw/FYM/gypsum applied
Current ~5% of farm cultivated (levelling for improved establishment); 20–40% spring crops

[Source: dd-issue-09, 2026-04-11]

Current System

Rotation

  • Autumn: wheat, oats, linseed, beans, OSR
  • Spring: oats, beans, barley, peas
  • Experimenting with pea/OSR mixes
  • All spring crops receive liquid starter fertiliser via drill

Input Reduction

  • Mixing own liquid fertiliser for several years
  • Stopped spraying insecticides
  • Reducing other pesticide use
  • Home-saving majority of seed; recently stopped applying seed dressings with no detriment to crop
  • “Which has also made life more simple as we have no seeds sitting in bags with dressing on”

Livestock Integration

  • 150 suckler cows — historically run as separate enterprise
  • Recently growing forage rye for early grazing on arable ground (calving late April/May)
  • Westawold and clover for early April grazing — cleans fields with brome problems
  • Rests pastures so not chasing grass early in growing season
  • Beginning mob grazing — “temperament of the cattle has changed dramatically, they are so much easier to work with”
  • Water and fencing remain main hurdles

Resilience Observations

“In yet another very wet harvest and autumn we have more winter crop established which I feel is down to the change in our methods of farming.”

Despite challenging altitude and soil type: soils becoming more resilient to extreme weather through the CA approach. “It often does feel like we have taken three steps forward and three steps back because of the altitude and the soil type… but I’m sure this will improve over time.”

[Source: dd-issue-09, 2026-04-11]

Issue 12 — A Year With Few Positives, But Cover Crops Would Have Helped (January 2021)

Edwin’s first article in eight months, written in the shadow of an autumn 2020 that mirrored 2019. Lockdown and calving provided the bright spots; 80% of the farm going to spring crops was manageable, and his son and daughter were on the farm together. Drilling spring OSR after a failed winter crop required pulling the old Xpress out of the nettles to break a capped surface — the rape sat motionless for weeks before taking off.

  • Calving 135 cows + 35 heifers in three groups (one mob-grazed, one strip-grazed, one outwintered + calved on permanent pasture); all heifers calved unassisted but the cows produced five difficult calvings
  • Harvest: slow start, completed 10 October, better than anticipated overall despite losing at least 10 days to rain
  • Autumn 2020 failure: wheat after spring rape, winter beans after spring barley — “a total failure” after 74mm over 36 hours on the weekend of 3 October followed by another 48mm over two weeks on already-fragile soils
  • Main regret: letting his focus on cover crops slip — “I think they are so important to Regen Ag and I feel we have let slip our focus on this for stabilizing our soil and retaining nutrients over winter. Today it could have opened up opportunities for us to alter the rotation and enable us to drill a winter crop”
  • BASE-UK: chairmanship and the committee’s Covid-era webinar programme credited with keeping confidence up “to continue down the road of CA, Regen Ag”

“In the midst of difficulty lies opportunity… I am sitting here thinking of a way of sugar coating it and to look for some positives but I really am struggling.”

[Source: dd-issue-12, 2026-04-13]

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