GET-UP-AND-GO ESSENTIAL FOR DURHAM OSR

At Brignall Farm on the eastern edge of the Pennines near Barnard Castle, Andrew Watson needs his oilseed rape to have plenty of get-up-and-go. After all, he can drill his crop two weeks earlier than those south of nearby Scotch Corner, yet he will be combining two weeks later.

“Running up to 700ft, we have to get our crops out of the blocks rapidly to keep ahead of both flea beetles and pigeons – not to mention the scourge of French partridges when the local shoot is active,” he stresses. “We want them to be well-rooted with a good big canopy by the end of October. And we like to see them grow away strongly from the winter, though not too early, as our clay loam soils take a while to warm-up enough to make their nitrogen available.

“Dekalb hybrids have always fitted our needs well for their spring as well as autumn vigour, strong disease resistance and all-important pod shatter resistance. If we find a variety that works for us, we tend to stick with it rather than always seeking the ‘next best thing’.

“Excalibur was great, DK Exalte even better and the DK Exstar we have these days is better still. It’s very vigorous without turning into a monster and it has the best combination of phoma, light leaf spot resistance and standing power you can get. What’s more, the 25ha we grew last season averaged 4.7t/ha.

“Our crop shot off the blocks this season. We took advantage of 50mm of rain at the beginning of August to drill into moisture and it was through the ground in a week and racing to 3-4 leaves by the bank holiday weekend. The shower we had a few days after drilling was just what the hybrid needed to take full advantage of really warm soils. We saw a little shot-holing but nothing to be concerned about with the rape powering away so strongly. It’s nicely set for another good season.”

A devastating flea beetle problem three years ago persuaded Mr Watson to bring his drilling forward to early August and the extra crop growth this has given since makes him wonder why he didn’t make the move ages ago.

Grown once every five years after winter barley and ahead of wheat, oats and a further wheat in his 200ha mainly-arable business, the crop is sown in a single pass at 35-40 seeds/m² with his faithful Vaderstad Rapid drill run behind a Simba ST bar with an award-winning, home-designed linkage.

Ahead of this, the barley stubble typically gets an 80t/ha application of water cake (reservoir sediment) from a nearby treatment works and around 2t/ha of chicken manure, all of which is nicely incorporated at drilling.

“Our system lifts the soil while preserving moisture,” explains Mr Watson. “It also works well in the wet, so it gives us the best of both establishment worlds. Combined with a vigorous hybrid and the manuring, it allows us to get the crop off to just the start needed to keep it well ahead of the pests.

“We haven’t used an insecticide for the last three autumns and, with the level of disease resistance we have in our varieties, don’t need to use a fungicide before stem extension either.

“A big canopy going into the winter means our crops already have plenty of nitrogen in them ahead of the spring. As soon as we can travel in February, we like to ‘say hello’ with around 75kg/ha of N.

“That way they have enough nutrition in the soil to support the vigorous growth and branching we want as soon as they need it.  Soil testing shows that the water cake provides us with plenty of sulphur, so we just use straight urea or ammonium nitrate – depending on relative cost.”

Plenty of N in the canopy and good spring vigour are also important in enabling Mr Watson to hold back the rest of the crop’s 200kg/ha of nitrogen as late as he can, so as much of it as possible goes into the seed rather than just producing extra canopy.

DK Exstar’s excellent light leaf spot resistance and standing power means he can hold back his stem extension spray too – generally until green bud. This allows the greatest PGR encouragement of branching rather than just stem shortening and gives a good platform for a flowering spray programme that is particularly critical given serious sclerotinia problems in the past.

“Having lost a lot of yield to serious April frosts the season before last, I don’t like our OSR to flower too early,” he adds. “And I’m happy to see flowering last for a good long time, even though this means we may have to go in with a second sclerotinia spray. Pod shatter resistance means that we can wait for the later-set pods to ripen without worrying about unnecessary seed losses from those at the top of the canopy.”

Jim’s technical ability to grow OSR is shown in his excellent results. “Last year, our OSR averaged 4.27t/ha with a good oil content. What’s more, coming in at 9% moisture it didn’t touch the drier and went straight onto the boat at Montrose docks.”

Noting DK Exsteel as his best performing variety, Jim’s approach to his crop starts with a late drill date of 11 September into a cultivated seed bed left with sufficient standing stubble to deter the pigeons. Mr Reid prefers to drill rather than broadcast seed, citing correct and even seed depth, as well as rolling, as critical.

“The DK hybrid seems to be perfectly suited to our climate,” Mr Reid says. “It has the good vigour and speed of development we need with late drilling. Its pod-shatter resistance is also really valuable. We get some high winds off the sea, and if one of those comes through just before harvest, it can do a lot of damage. It’s also slightly later to grow away and mature than the other varieties we’re growing, although flowering at around the same time. You don’t want a variety that flowers too early here because you don’t get the pollinators until later into the spring. What is does really well is branch out to fill the space, flowering profusely to give us plenty of pods to soak-up the mid-summer sun.”

The East-Scotland location provides some pest relief. “Slugs aren’t normally much of a problem on these soils, and although we do get flea beetle shot-holing, it’s nothing like growers down south have had to deal with. The larvae don’t seem to get into the stem and the crop powers through.”

Late drilling means plants are still relatively small going into the spring so weed competition can be an issue. To guard against this, the crop gets a pre or early post-emergence mixture of metazachlor with either clomazone or quinmerac. An autumn graminicide is often needed for barley volunteers too.

Spring fertilisation consists of two dressings of Axan (27% N + 9% SO₃) or Sulphan (24% N + 15% SO₃) followed by one of Extran (33.5% N) to ensure the crop gets the sulphur it requires.

“Tissue testing has also shown that molybdenum and boron are low, so we apply these at stem extension,” Mr Anderson explains. “And we find extra magnesium at flowering really helps too. Because DK Exsteel has a strong 7 for light leaf spot resistance, an application of Kestrel (prothioconazole + tebuconazole) keeps the disease well in check ahead of flowering.  With the extended flowering period, we’re keen to ensure the crop is kept green, as well as covering the risk of sclerotinia. So, we go back in with a relatively robust mid-flowering application of Kestrel plus azoxystrobin.”

Agrii agronomist, Iain Anderson, sums up saying “DK Exsteel is one of the strongest here and it is doing us a great job.”

Utilising a toolkit approach to combating the increasing challenges of growing OSR, Rob has been finding sheep invaluable in making the most of his early drilled crop.. This season he grazed all 11.4ha of the DK Excited he sowed for a week in mid-November.

“When our five-year rotation puts the OSR on our most fertile ground, we can end up with a worryingly over-thick and over-forward canopy by mid-November depending on the weather. Which is where the sheep have really been useful, removing almost all the foliage and with it, and we hope early disease as well as any CSFB larvae,” points out Mr Atkin. “They have also opened-up the crop nicely and provided extra manure, of course.

“It certainly took courage, and we were very careful to move them on quickly. Immediately after grazing the crop looked pretty bare – particularly one area that was taken down a little too far. Even this recovered well as the crop grew away strongly from winter, however. In fact, it probably had a better structure going into stem extension than the later-sown crops we didn’t graze. Come harvest, our yield maps will make very interesting viewing.”

Although limited by the late frosts and poor summer light levels, Mr Atkin was well-pleased with the 3.9t/ha he brought in from the DK Excited he tried for the first-time last year alongside the 3.8t/ha of his DK Exalte – itself up more than half a tonne on 2020. He sees the new hybrid’s rather less rapid speed of leaf development going into the winter together with strong disease resistance, TuYV resistance and standing power especially well-suited to earlier drilling. Its notably strong and rapid spring development is also proving just what’s needed in the wake of winter grazing. 

“Rather than going for the highest yields, we want to get a consistent 4t/ha-plus from our OSR every year with the least possible risk,” he stresses. “Earlier drilling with the most suitable variety is a key part of this. Every bit as important, though, is getting the seed into moisture evenly with good seed-to-soil contact.

The Atkin’s use a Shakaerator at 6-8” and then drill to a consistent 1.5cm following sewage sludge application to ensure moisture, citing even sowing (deliberately kept down to around 40 seeds/m2) at a shallow depth key to consistent establishment. This is followed by rolling.

“The most important thing for us is to get our crops out of the blocks quickly, “insists Mr Atkins. “They also need to have the greatest get-up-and-go in the spring. As well as vigorous establishment and rapid early development, we choose our varieties for the most robust all-round strength. This includes disease resistance, standing power and pod shatter resistance so we can manage the harvest for the least weather and combining losses.

“That way we are firmly on the front foot with our management, and have the greatest flexibility to match our agronomy to whatever the season throws at us. We always like to have well-grown oilseed rape going into the winter. But we are equally conscious that having it too thick and forward coming into the spring can get in the way of developing the most efficient light-intercepting canopies as well as increasing light leaf spot pressure.

Rob finds hybrids like DK Excited are a perfect choice for growers looking to sheep graze, thanks to their superior recovery abilities and fast spring regrowth.

“With sheep in our armoury in addition to the traditional seed, fertilisation and crop protection tools, it looks like we may have a very valuable extra risk management tool.”

Value-added High Oleic Low Linolenic (HOLL) oilseed rape has been a part of the Ross family’s north Norfolk arable rotation at Canister Hall Farm near Walsingham for the past 16 years.

The £30/tonne premium it currently attracts on top of all bonuses is clearly less significant than it used it be with rapeseed values at well over £600/t for the coming harvest. But with today’s HOLL hybrids having as much yield potential as and all the agronomic strengths of leading ‘double low’ varieties, Andrew Ross sees no reason to stop growing it. All the more so as he has never failed to secure his ADM contract’s oil specification and certainly doesn’t foresee the market staying as strong as it currently is forever.

“We only started growing OSR in 2007 to give more flexibility and breadth to our cereal and sugar beet-based rotation,” he explains. “This coincided with the arrival of the first HOLL variety, Splendor. So, it was the perfect choice on our ‘virgin ground’. Since then, we’ve grown a succession of Vistive hybrids culminating in V367OL this season.

“The real performance breakthrough came with V316OL which went in straight at the top of the RL. Then we saw pod shatter resistance in the varieties for the first time. This is a trait we would never be without now as it allows us to hold off on desiccation to maximise our output without the risk of serious seed loss.”

Andrew and his cousin Stuart,who run the 590ha arable business at Canister Hall and several other nearby farms with one full time staff member, grow around 60ha of oilseed rape annually, wherever possible after winter barley. With vining peas also added to their rotation, OSR is typically grown once every six or seven years.

Although yet to lose a crop to cabbage stem flea beetle, significant pressure from the pest – not to mention gamebirds – has prompted the W.J.F Ross Ltd team to bring oilseed rape sowing forward from the third to the second week of August.

This season the value of earlier sowing – and having winter barley to enable it – was really underlined when spring barley harvesting delays mean some of the crop couldn’t be sown until the end of the month.

“Flea beetle pressures were generally lower last autumn,” recalls Andrew Ross. “Even so our later-sown rape was so badly attacked we feared it might not make it. While the hybrid’s early get-up-and-go and decent establishment conditions got the crop through, it has remained well behind our earlier-sown ground and much more patchy.

“Unlike the earlier-sown area which went into flowering well-structured, even and full of potential, we’re unlikely to get 4t/ha from it. The real difference here has been winter barley. Even after baling the straw, which we swap for muck with a neighbour, having it in the rotation means we can be sure of getting our OSR in early enough.”

Sowing the crop into reasonably long barley stubble in a single pass behind the legs of a Cousins Patriot stubble cultivator means the family lose as little moisture as possible while lifting sandy loam soils which have a tendency to pack down fairly hard.  Following-up smartly with a Cambridge roll gives extra moisture conservation and the best seed-to-soil contact.

Having found DAP applied ahead of sowing was displaced away from the rows by the Patriot’s legs, they now use their Lanquip self-propelled sprayer to target the permitted 30 kg N/ha post drilling.

“It’s surprising how much moisture our soils can retain under a cereal even when the surface is dry,” Andrew Ross says. “Apart from anything else, sowing our rape early ensures we make the most of this by leaving the soil bare for the least possible time.

“We are reducing tillage as much as we can and growing oat and vetch Mid-Tier Stewardship cover crops ahead of our spring crops, as well as regularly applying farmyard manure. All of which is really helping the OSR by improving our ground’s structure, its organic matter and moisture-holding capacity.

“We continue to plough ahead of the beet to incorporate the muck and our cover crop residues as we don’t have a mulch drill. However, our Vaderstad Rapid allows us to direct drill spring barley where black-grass isn’t problematic, providing we destroy the preceding cover crop effectively enough with glyphosate. We are also drilling more of our winter cereals directly these days too but only if conditions are right. And where the soil needs it, we do so after a single pass with the Patriot.”

In addition to a wide rotation, earlier sowing and good moisture preservation, keeping their  sowing rate down to around 40 seeds/m²  is another important element in the family’s OSR recipe. That way, even in a very growthy season, they get strong-stemmed stands with enough space to make the most of their HOLL hybrids’ branching abilities.

They are also meticulous in their crop care to get their OSR through to flowering with the most productive canopies. This includes three splits of spring nitrogen with sulphur, timely autumn and stem extension fungicide applications with extra manganese, and getting out with the gas guns as early as October for the most determined pigeon defence.

“Alongside sugar beet, spring barley and vining peas, oilseed rape is valuable in our zero tolerance approach to black-grass,” points out Andrew Ross. “We have to be on our toes, though, as it’s too easy for the weed to escape notice under the canopy.

“As a rule, we follow-up a robust pre-em with clethodim in mid-October to hold any black-grass back so we don’t have to go in too early with the propyzamide.  With the much milder winters we’re getting, Kerb in mid-December is giving us much better results than earlier applications.

“Glyphosate ahead of the OSR harvest can be helpful too in getting rid of late-emerging weeds sheltering under the canopy,” he adds. “Pod shatter resistance allows us to hold-off on this for as long as we can to maximise yields and all-important oil contents. Last year, for instance, we didn’t spray until the third week in July, having applied the pod sticker we’ve always used as a belt and braces in late June.

“Not drilling wheat on ground with black-grass concerns until mid-October gives us time for a stale seedbed after the OSR if we need it, too.”

While it’s never been the least stressful crop to grow, Andrew Ross continues to find oilseed rape, in general, and HOLL, in particular, a really useful addition to the rotation. At current rapeseed values, he is especially pleased to have stuck with it despite CSFB.

With commodity markets as volatile as they have become, he and his cousin also appreciate the extra assurance of contract-growing a crop which consistently delivers them a premium for its superior food industry frying characteristics.  After all, even if the season prevents it doing more than 3.5t/ha, the 65ha they currently have in the ground is worth almost £7000 more than ordinary rapeseed under their current HOLL contract.

Robust trialling of emerging new varieties at scale alongside current favourites and involvement in the ADAS YEN network are important parts of the extra layer of care going into McGregor Farms’ consistently high-yielding and award-winning oilseed rape recipe on the Scottish Borders near Coldstream.

This season, arable manager, David Fuller and his team are looking at four promising Dekalb hybrids side-by-side with three of their farm favourites in 0.4ha strips as part of the 720ha of winter OSR they grow each year in their 3450ha arable business spread across 15 Tweed valley units.

Mostly undulating medium sandy clay loams surrounded by hills and varying from 70-190m above sea level, the land is capable of consistently high OSR outputs. Five- year average yields are currently 4.84t/ha and, at 6.2t/ha, the 2021 Oilseed YEN crop of DK Expansion earned the business a silver award for its performance.

David, who has entered an OSR crop in the YEN since 2019, finds its annual report valuable in giving a detailed breakdown of how the crop performed, benchmarked against all the other entrants, and identifying the most important success factors.

Alongside this, the detailed intelligence the Bayer strip trials give on individual variety vigour, speed of development before winter, earliness and speed of spring regrowth, flowering, maturity and yield show which varieties are best suited to their system.

“Amongst other things, the YEN reports underline that what really counts in delivering yield is seeds/m²,” he points out. “This comes down to the right canopy structure. And getting the right canopy structure depends on growing the right varieties and managing them in the best way.

“The strip trials really help us to compare our variety options side-by-side under our own conditions. This year we’re comparing DK Exposé, DK Excited, DK Expectation and DK Extremus with the DK Expansion, DK Exsteel and DK Exstar we already grow.

 “Our OSR area stays roughly the same every year, and we only grow hybrids because of the traits they come with. Pod-shatter resistance is particularly important here. August is our wettest month, and wet-to-dry conditions can make the crop go brittle.

“Where a variety doesn’t have shatter resistance, we invariably see a lot of losses and plenty of volunteers in the following stubble. Often at harvest we have to break-off OSR to get started on the wheat and need to know the seed will still be in the pods when we return to it.

“Although phoma is rarely a problem for us, the Rlm7 gene supported by polygenic stem canker resistance means we don’t have to worry about it or spray to protect against the disease. Turnip yellows virus resistance (TuYV) is another yield-protecting trait now delivering extra peace of mind.

“With brassicas historically grown quite widely for livestock in our area, we grow clubroot tolerant varieties on any land we know to be infected,” he adds.

As well as their Dekalb favourites, McGregor Farms currently have a substantial area of  Aurelia in the ground, together with Crocodile on clubroot land.

Growth characteristics particularly influence David Fuller’s variety choice. He emphasises that, with yield so dependent on establishment, an even plant stand is crucial.

“Three quarters of our crop is goes in after winter wheat which certainly doesn’t come to harvest early here,” he says. “So, first and foremost, we want good autumn vigour and the ability to grow away strongly from any establishment challenges.

“Coming into the spring, we look for varieties with a steady spring growth that won’t come into flower too early. We don’t favour early flowering as we want to avoid any risk from the sort of late frosts we had last year. Even though the damage they caused didn’t show in our yields, it’s a worry we can do without.

 “We take comfort in a long flowering period, and are happy for our crops to take their time coming to harvest. So long as they don’t push us unnervingly late, that is!”

With the genetics set, the management at McGregor Farms is designed to make the most of it. Two 7m Simba SL 700s are used to establish the crop into cereal stubbles in a single-pass system. The legs are generally set at a depth of 250mm with starter fertiliser dribbled behind the second set of discs in line with the legs. The seed then goes in at a row spacing of 450mm – again in line with the legs – behind the double D ring presses, with a light harrow to cover it and an Aqueel roller to finish the job.

“We aim to drill all 700ha in a week, starting after 20 August and finishing by 1 September – that’s our critical window,” says David. “Because good establishment is so crucial, we concentrate on getting the crop into the right soil conditions and achieving the right plant population with even spacing and germination. We want 25 plants/m² coming into the spring to give plenty of room for branching and canopy development, so we generally sow at 35-40 seeds/m².

“We like the Aqueel roller because it runs in the wet as well as holding critical seedbed moisture when it’s dry. If conditions are particularly dry, though, we’ll follow-up with a set of Cambridge rolls for even better moisture preservation and seed-to-soil contact.”

A pre-emergence herbicide still delivers the most reliable broadleaf-weed control, so a combination quinmerac and metazachlor are applied soon after drilling. While the team haven’t historically found grassweeds an issue in OSR, propyzamide is now employed to deal with increasingly problematic brome and rat’s tail fescue.

The starter fertiliser puts 19kgN/ha with 27kg/ha of P near the seed where it will do most good. Because the ground is often short of magnesium, this is routinely applied through the sprayer in the autumn alongside boron. Around stem extension, the crop also gets foliar manganese and molybdenum with extra magnesium and boron.

An N-Sensor on its ‘absolute’ setting tailors nitrogen rate to crop growth in spring. This results in around 200kgN/ha applied in two splits as liquid 30%N with 9.5% SO₃ – the first going on towards the end of February with a slightly larger dose a month later.

Light leaf spot is our main disease concern, so we start our fungicide programme with prothioconazole as late in the autumn as we can travel,” notes David Fuller.  “A combination of tebuconazole and azoxystrobin at yellow-bud in mid-March also helps to shape the canopy. Then, we go in again about three weeks later with a boscalid-based flowering spray to take care of sclerotinia.

“Aviator (bixafen+prothioconazole) has worked well in our recent trialling with FieldView recording, so this is an approach we may well be using more of in the future.”.

Just as he sees even establishment and early season management are critical to success for OSR, David Fuller believes the way the crop is treated towards the end of the season must not be ignored.

“We find all the attention we pay to getting the canopy right makes a huge difference,” he insists. “Having got it there we want to make the most of the sunlight during June and July, so try to keep it going for as long as possible. The stay-green value of an SDHI   at flowering helps here, and we hold-off our glyphosate desiccation until as long as we dare. Which is another good reason for pod-shatter resistance hybrids.

“When you set up a crop with the genetics that fit the system you’re looking to follow, monitor it closely and give it the attention it deserves, that’s when a good average OSR crop becomes a real winner, concludes David Fuller.

“With rapeseed set to deliver as a good £800/t for us this harvest we have no doubt it’s worth putting time and effort into getting every extra seed you can tease out of it.”

Double OSR Benefits for Borders Dairy Business

Unusual both for the area and enterprise, oilseed rape is proving valuable in more ways than one in the Laird family’s Peeblesshire dairy business.

Following success with the crop in their arable rotation further north at Kinross where they rear their dairy youngstock, the DK Exsteel grown at Blyth Bridge last season produced a very encouraging 5.5t/ha. At the same time, it yielded a handsome crop of straw as quality bedding for the award-winning 550-cow pedigree Holstein herd, currently averaging 12,200 litres/cow/year.

“Cow comfort is a big thing for us,” explains Colin Laird. “OSR straw is more fibrous than cereal straw, so it breaks-up easily and separates out well. Most importantly the cows really like it in their deep bed cubicles, and you’ll struggle to find cleaner cows than ours.

“As well as rewarding us well through the combine, our DK Exsteel grows good and tall. It’s difficult to estimate the actual straw yield, but it is definitely also a bumper crop in this department. And it is proving a good cleaning crop too, providing a much better entry for our seed wheat-growing than grass.

“OSR helps to make our high-production dairy system as sustainable and self-sufficient as it can be,” he points out. “We mainly feed our own home-grown cereals from Kinross in a total mixed ration with grass silage and don’t have the option of maize. So, it fits really well in our rotation here.”

Once again, this year’s 17ha of DK Exsteel has established well after grass at Blyth Bridge.Despite some problems with cabbage stem flea beetle, its early vigour enabled it to pull away strongly.

When it comes to growing the crop – both at Kinross and Blyth Bridge – Colin Laird relies heavily on the experience of his Agrii agronomist, Iain Anderson who explains that the local soils and climate are very well suited to the crop.

“Scotland is prone to soils with low pH, and OSR is fairly tolerant,” he notes. “Club root can be a problem where large amounts of swedes, turnips or other brassica fodders are grown, but that’s not an issue here.

“OSR fits-in well after grass leys which tend to sop-up the nitrogen and hold back a following cereal. The OSR blasts on through, though.

“We have always found hybrids far more reliable. We were growing DK Exalte at Kinross but are now moving entirely to DK Exsteel. We really like Dekalb hybrids for their excellent vigour and speed of development. What’s more, their pod-shatter resistance brings us valuable peace of mind at harvest time.

“DK Exsteel is suiting us very well,” reports Mr Anderson. “Along with autumn vigour, it also gives us just the sort of spring growth we need. It isn’t desperately quick out of the blocks, but keeps going, putting on good growth. It grows tall with a thick stem and puts out plenty of branches, which is what we like to see.”

At Blyth Bridge, land coming out of grass is ploughed before OSR, but the barley stubble at Kinross gets a pass with a 3m Sumo Trio before the crop is drilled into the medium loam soil with the farm’s 4m Horsch Pronto.

“We aim to get our OSR established in mid-August,” says Mr Laird. “That can mean a clash with spring barley, which we usually haven’t harvested by then, so our OSR at Kinross mostly follows winter barley.”

At 50 seeds/m², the team consider their seed rate a little on the high side for a hybrid, but insist they’d rather be looking at a crop in the autumn than for it; especially so, as it isn’t unusual for young crops to suffer in a harsh autumn at their 200-300m elevation. They generally expect only around 50% establishment, even with a hybrid.

Agrii-Start Release applied at drilling gives the crop 30kg N/ha with 40kg/ha of protected phosphate to help it get underway.  Boron is also applied as tissue testing at Kinross has revealed a general lack of both boron and molybdenum.

Metazachlor goes on at early post emergence to keep broadleaved weeds at bay, with a follow-up graminicide applied in early October. A strobilurin fungicide with a growth regulator at this stage helps to keep the crop canopy in check.

“Light leaf spot is a particular problem up here,” reports Mr Anderson. “So, our focus is on preventing it from taking hold. DK Exsteel’s resistance rating of 7 is really useful, allowing us to keep the crop well-protected with our fungicide programme.

“The crops don’t really get going until early March and we often get late frosts. So, we prefer varieties that don’t flower too early, as well as those that are especially good at compensating for any early pod loss.”

The Blyth Farms’ OSR gets its first dose of N fertiliser once soil temperatures climb above 5°C. This is accompanied by 50-60kg/ha SO₃ and followed by two splits of nitrogen. As the land isn’t hungry, it generally only receives 160-180kgN/ha in total.

Molydenum and boron are applied at stem extension, with magnesium added at flowering. Kestrel (prothioconazole+ tebuconazole) keeps LLS at bay while just one ‘well-timed’ strobilurin is applied at flowering to check sclerotinia. This is also designed to keep the green leaf area going for as long as possible to take advantage of the long, mid-summer days.

“It's care and attention throughout the season that results in OSR that performs,” stresses Mr Anderson, digging-up a plant to illustrate his point. Along with a strong tap root, there’s a thick ball of roots with a strong, stout stem, branching well.

“DK Exsteel’s big, thick stems are great for growth and for keeping the crop standing, although they do take some desiccating with Roundup (glyphosate) at harvest!”

Mr Laird recognises this care and attention means a considerable investment in the crop, especially at a time when input prices are rising fast.

“We used to consider OSR as just a break crop but now it has to be more than that,” he concludes. “After all, we want to make at least an extra pound for every one we spend on it. With our cows we’ve always found performance is so much better if you look after them well, and it’s much the same with our OSR.”