Sharing Data, Growing Together: My Experience with AHDB Farmbench Groups “Hey Dad, let’s share all our performance and farm data with our neighbours!” For many farmers, that suggestion would sound like a nightmare rather than an opportunity. Yet, when I look at the farmers I most admire, those who run resilient, profitable, and forward-thinking businesses, …
Practical glyphosate stewardship for direct drill and regenerative farmers For farmers working with direct drilling or regenerative systems, glyphosate isn’t just another herbicide – it’s a crucial tool. Whether it’s managing grass-weeds, clearing stale seedbeds, or taking down cover crops, glyphosate helps create a clean, manageable seedbed without the need for cultivation. But glyphosate’s performance …
Written by Dr David Cutress: IBERS, Aberystwyth University. • Seaweeds have long had suggested benefits for agricultural use• Research suggests green seaweeds to be beneficial for soil/plant amendments and redseaweeds to have some potential for animal feeds• To be able to include at meaningful levels, the production and supply chain ofseaweeds needs to be researched …
Looking back with a Crystal Ball I am sitting here at the end of June, the weekend before Groundswell. I have just read through my last article I wrote for the Direct Driller magazine, which is from September last year and wondering what I would tell myself if I could go back in time to …
By Anna Woodley from Trinity AgTech For generations, farmers have been finely tuned to the physical and financial cycles of their land – balancing input costs with yield, timing the market, and managing unpredictable weather. The ability to manage complexity and make it pay is a defining skill of British agriculture. But in a rapidly …
Dry Weather Challenges Across the Rotation By Phil Rowbottom, for Direct Driller Magazine It’s fair to say that 2025 has been a year of extremes — and not in a good way. The dry spring and early summer have had a telling impact across every crop on the farm, and this season’s challenges have tested …
By Tim Ashley, Edaphos Agronomy Introduction The 2025 wheat season has revealed significant vulnerabilities in cereal production systems across the UK. Yellow rust (Puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici) has emerged as the most problematic disease of the year, affecting a wide range of wheat varieties, including those previously considered resistant. The widespread reliance on fungicides, …
Yellow Rust: A Symptom of Systemic Weakness in Cereal Cropping Systems Read More »
Written by Susan Wilson from Aphaeas Agriculture Bio-stimulants, soil conditioners, bio-fertilisers and bio-pesticides have been key features of the move away from high level usage of conventional chemicals and fertilisers and are now mainstream – yet the market is still largely unregulated. This is an attempt to clarify the situation we find ourselves in. The …
Regulation of bio-stimulants, bio-fertilisers and bio-pesticides Read More »
Written by Rothamsted Research Study of 17 English farms finds nature-friendly practices can support yields, but only modest schemes are financially viable without subsidies A major four-year study across English farms has found that nature-friendly agroecological practices can enhance biodiversity and boost some crop yields, but high costs and land-use trade-offs mean most approaches remain …
Agroecological Farming Boosts Soil and Biodiversity – But Economic Barriers Remain Read More »
June 2025 It has been over a year since my last DD article and rather a lot has happened in that time which is affecting all businesses and especially farming. I think there are opportunities out there if you are prepared to take on the challenge but there is a lot of uncertainty in the …
