Saxlingham – The Big Push

October presented so many opportunities to earn money that I had to take advantage as best I could whilst remembering I had my own crops in fields 2 and 7 to harvest as well as my grass in fields 27 and 30. It was going to be a very busy month but I was determined to be home in time for dinner each ‘week’.

The first week presented the expectation of rain so instead of starting my harvests immediately I decided to take a bale wrapping contract. Then I set a worker loose in field 16 to do a cultivating contract…

After the rain left off I initially harvested field 7 before heading off to field 2 where once more it was necessary to obstruct the traffic on the A140…

…Mr ‘Red Van’ man hooted several times but farm work takes time and he’s really not helping! Harvesting of the Soy Beans went well although you can see some crop damage in this shot…

…Ultimately ‘All was safely gathered in’ in time for an 8pm dinner…

…In the bottom right corner you can see we have harvested nearly 87kltrs of canola and 44kltrs of soy beans which should make some good money for the farm in December / January.

In the second week of the month I decided to take a massive corn harvesting contract in field 42 and borrowed the equipment. I got a big John Deere harvester and Corn Header…

…and a Unimog with a Krampe trailer…

…The trailer looked impressive but it quickly became apparent that it wasn’t particularly good at taking a big load of corn – it’s loading maxed out at just over 19kltrs. As the sell point was a very long way from the field I found myself burning through fuel fast and the worker on the harvester reporting that their grain tank was full long before I even got there! The waiting was time lost and I realised I’d have to do something about it. The only solution was a trip back to the farm with the Unimog to refuel and to swap to my own Bailey trailer. This improved the amount I could shift each time to 23.5kltrs and now I was at the sell point as the worker reported their tank full…

…Some time saved making completion of the job before the sun set possible. Was it worth all the heartache – Over £30k for a week’s work says yes!

Having made myself £30k I then had to spend £36k to buy a Hoe. My recently sown oat fields had weeds growing in them and this was the preferred method of dealing with the situation. It’s a slight setback to my aim of expanding the arable side of the farm but like the bale-wrapper, a hoe will almost certainly earn its keep. I’ve bought the Pöttinger Rotocare V12400. I sent one of the workers off with it to clean out the weeds…

…While I sent another worker with hired equipment to cultivate field 38…

…and tasked myself with another contract to cultivate field 26…

…This is another field under active consideration for purchase.

The latter half of the week was spent mowing and baling my grass fields – Here’s the Valtra with the Claas baler attacking the lines of grass in field 27…

…mid-October and the nights are really starting to draw in! A little rain was expected overnight and early in the next week but with the grass tightly baled and going to be turned into silage, a little water won’t hurt. I decided it was time for bed – the bale wrapping can wait for next week.

Playing ‘Hunt the Bale’ in the dawn’s early light…

…and even worse with the sun over the horizon…

…A truly autumnal start to the last week of October. Then the morning rain arrived and I had two tractors queuing to wrap and collect the bales in field 27…

…You can just see the Massey 6S through the trees to the right of centre. The heavy downpour has also given the millstream a strong flow…

With time in hand I sent a worker off to do a cultivating contract in field 42 – the one we harvested the week before last. Then, with the rains finally cleared I was able to proceed with the wrapping and transporting of my soon-to-be silage…

…If you remember the work I put in to improving my grass fields back in August – The good news is that I doubled the yield from the two fields and that bodes well for next year’s silage production.

With a little light left I decided to take a final hoeing job myself in field 22. With the weeds not visible and the light starting to fail I decided to take advantage of the game’s ‘tramlines’ to ensure I covered the whole field…

…Effectively this is GPS which almost all modern tractors and harvesters have fitted only it’s displayed in the cab for the operator rather than as pretty lines superimposed on the crop 😅 With my worker in the adjacent field I was able to pop over there after completing my hoeing to see them finishing up on the cultivating…

That concluded the month and it has been a busy one. After all the contract work the bank balance sits just below £300k which sets me up nicely for a winter purchase of a field in the £3-400k range while keeping a reasonably healthy amount of cash over for the usual farming expenses. Lets see what Winter brings.