The latest Tillage Edge podcast from Teagasc features a reflection on the year that was 2021 from UK-based farm manager, Andy Mahon.

He was in conversation with Teagasc’s Michael Hennessy.

“We had an interesting harvest - one to remember for good reasons and bad,” Mahon confirmed.

“The weather through September, October and November has been amazing.”

According to Mahon, winter wheat crops had been looking well up to June.

“The weather turned quite wet at that stage,” he confirmed.

“My crop disease control strategy had been fairly lean up to that point. I tested the crops for septoria post T2.

“This approach paid a dividend as the tail end of the growing season was quite wet. Disease pressure really ramped up leading into harvest," he explained.

Mahon explained that the harvest of 2021 was characterised by very cloudy and dull weather conditions.

Winter wheat crops were harvested at the end of July.

Mahon further explained: “We averaged 11t/ha. This was an unbelievable level of output for us; we are normally around the 9t mark.

“A number of the crops followed peas. So that obviously helped."

Mahon does not plough at all. Combinable crops grown on the farm are established using a no-till system.

He continued:

“Spring wheat crops were less good though. Ground conditions were badly affected by frost throughout April, so crops were very slow in getting going."

Overall, it wasn’t a good year for Mahon's spring crops. He did get 4.5t/ha to 5t/ha with spring wheat.

"That’s very disappointing for us," he stressed.

“Spring oats, however, did do well. Our long-term average with the crop is around 5.5t. And we were bang on that level of performance this year.”

“Oat straw was very green at harvest though. But the bushel weights for the 2021 oat crops were excellent.

“As a consequence, all the crops harvested this year were dried. So it was an expensive harvest in that respect.”