How to Grow Outstanding Winter Barley for £65.36/t Variable Cost - Cranborne Farms

Key Factors:

• Focus on Soil Heath and Crop Nutrition 

• ‘Mosaic’ Approach to Field Blocks

• Targeted Foliar Application

Dan Moore manages 3,000 acres at Cranborne Farms, part of Gascoyne Estates in Dorset. The farm combines CSS and SFI agreements, a grazing partnership, and a 50% winter/spring arable enterprise, all with a focus on cover cropping and regenerative practices. Several SSSIs also sit within the farmed land.

Split by the village of Cranborne, the farm features chalk downland to the west and clay over gravels to the east. While predominantly cereals-heavy, crops like peas, oats, and (recently) poppies are part of the rotation.

Barley is central to the system, with Maris Otter drilled in winter and Laureate in spring, both grown for malting.

Dan shares agronomy duties with an independent agronomist and works alongside team members Lee and Micky. Luke from YAGRO visited to learn more...

Let’s talk Varieties. You’ve grown Maris Otter for a few years running and have stuck with it. What do you like about this variety?

It’s a 60-year-old variety, so there’s a lot of heritage there, but you can still go fairly low N. We’re pushing for quality – not yield. We target malting spec every time and follow a spring barley crop in the rotation, as wheat admix is a big no-no for the end market.  

The Market Median for Malting Barley across the YAGRO Platform is up towards £80/t, so you’re well below. You managed to maintain 2023 yields but cut fertiliser spend by a third this year (down to £100.77/ha) - how?

We’ve been focussing on treating each field individually, with a real focus on crop health and nutrition overall. 

Although we’ve reduced our N, we’ve increased use of humic and fulvic acids as a carbon source. There was a desire that by developing plant health we could drop our fungicide, but as Maris Otter is such an old variety, this didn’t quite work. 

Our focus on targeted crop nutrition includes Tissue and SAP Analysis to direct us which way to go. 

We test the soil N residue regularly and use data to invest in areas that show the most likelihood of returning that investment.

Importantly, everything must be data driven. We’re always running trials responsibly in a measured way, seeing if we can reduce inputs to build up soil health. That’s more important to us than cutting costs. Though, of course, optimising costs and achieving healthy yields does help with our margins. 

Application of a Foliar Fertiliser in November 2024 was a new strategy. What caused this decision?

Simply trying to support the plants through a stressful time. That foliar was mainly a carbon source, with some silicon (potassium silicate and salicylic acid). This is about bolstering plant cell wall strength, aiding resilience against stresses and hopefully mitigating the use of other inputs. 

We’re trying to move away from soil applied Nitrogen to let the soil recover. We’re on a path to reducing our artificial fertilisers below 180kg/ha on our winter wheats and wish to do so across the board. 

Hopefully, this increases soil cycling and reduces our reliance on artificial inputs. 

We did some soil testing last year and found 90kg/ha following three years of herbal lays, rather than 40 kg/ha following oats. We owe this to our cattle partnership, which is a big part of our system – but it’s certainly nice to see the data showing what you believe it should. 

Alongside fertiliser, your 2024 spring barley herbicide applications were down roughly a third (to £67.84/ha). Do you have much blackgrass pressure around here?

We’re lucky – at the minute, blackgrass isn’t a huge issue. We struggle more with bromes due to the direct drilling. 

We’re targeted in how we use herbicide. We apply early and let the season progress. In the spring we do a lot of hand rouging, which takes time but shows real results later in the year. 

Resistant ryegrass being found in the UK is potentially a problem for us if it goes widespread. We’re no-till farmers. And we’re not mucking around with our glyphosate rates, they’re high and it’s an important control. 

One input that did rise was PGR – that tripled following 2023 (up to £6.06/ha). Was this in response to lodging or the weather?

The Maris Otter came out of the winter strongly following the autumn foliar application. It was incredibly thick and tillered out. We need to reach malting quality so we can’t afford lodged crops. We also had almost double rainfall for the 2023 calendar year, so we had to be flexible and make the call to apply PGR. 

Treating fields on an individual basis rather than blocking crops takes a lot more management for me and Lee (Spray Operator) but it pays dividends in the long run and allows us to be much more targeted. 

Talk to me about this mosaic approach to your fields. 

Essentially, we try to have no two same-fields next to each other. Firstly, this really drives biodiversity and helps beneficials. But it also prevents disease spread across the farm. We see this as cultural disease control. 

We haven’t sprayed insecticide on this farm for 5 years, and we intend to keep it that way. Biodiversity is a slow process, but we’re seeing results. More beetle in the fields helping with slug pressures, more lacewings, more spiders... 

Your website (Cranborne.co.uk) states you’re aiming for a 20% biodiversity by 2030. Why is biodiversity so important to you? And how helpful are SFI’s for these aims? 

Sustainability factors into everything we do. From regen techniques, to conservation efforts and targeted species re-introduction. We’re also practicing agroforestry on farm. We’re trying to build biodiversity whilst maintaining food production, and the synergy between the two is what’s important to us. 

Some of the observations are quite interesting. We’re still feeling our way, but we use data as much as possible. We're part of Martin Down Farmer Cluster, whereby we collect data around biodiversity and natural habitats together to tie into the bigger picture.

We’re not afraid to take risks, and we aim to always be making data driven decisions. We use a lot of forecasting tools. 

And what’s your favourite piece of machinery on farm?

We direct drill as much as possible – we have a Claydon Stubble Rake helping us cover ground and reduce our slug pressure and level out residue after harvest. We also have a Horizon DSX which does a majority of our drilling, using disc rather than tines. 

The sprayer is my favourite though. The technology built into it is incredible, down to the individual nozzle, and has been a great leap forwards for controlling our costs – considering our use of liquid N especially. 

The YAGRO Platform has become a big part of what we do. It’s great for benchmarking on a national level and supports our input purchasing. Data around varieties has also proved valuable for selection. 

What’s next on your agenda? 

We’ve got some exciting things in the pipeline around soil health, plant health and improving plant health overall. I feel like it’s an exciting time for us. 

With thanks to Dan Moore for his time speaking to us. And congratulations to the whole team at Cranborne Farms for winning our Best in Field Award for Winter Barley, 2024.