19 September 2012.
Finally the OSR has been drilled at Walford Hall, and into a good seedbed taking everything into account.
There are a few areas of concern notably:
the compacted headlands against a woodland, which could have been subsoiled.
a small area that was clearly very wet last spring that was avoided by sprayman, that was and is still very weedy with large clumps of couch grass
A strip of 24 metres running the length of the field which contained a herbicide trial.
Also whilst not an area of concern as such, there is also a 2ha block of HLS stewardship within the field.
We have gone with a Maxximus semi dwarf hybrid. Admittedly this is my first experience of a dwarf but I am excited by the choice. Sowing rate was 50-55 seeds per metre squared. The seed was treated with Cruiser.
Now the hard work begins monitoring the crop for slugs and pigeons.
The cultivation techniques have been a simple min till operation with a medium legged cultivation and disc system. (As this blog will be viewed by students I am not going to name the cultivator used, I expect them to research the options available.) The cultivation took place on the 18th September, with drilling the fllowing day – the 19th September.
I expect the crop will be rolled, however a small area will be left to show the effects of rolling – or not. This is always my philosophy on demonstarting agronomy trials – dont show the best, show the worst too. That way we really see the benefits of good techniques.
Slug pellets will be applied as soon as Shropshire dries out.
Thanks for reading my first blog on OSR!
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