With only a few exceptions, all the spring crops were finally sown during early to mid-May. Since then, the weather has improved and, while temperatures were slow to rise, growing conditions have proved fit enough to allow the crops to become well-established.
As mentioned in the previous report, some of the main concerns for this season’s crop is the likely yield penalty because of the delayed sowing. Only time will tell what effect this will have on barley performance and availability this harvest.
Crop conditions
Winter cereals have made great strides forward in May and are now looking to have caught up from the backward stages being seen at the start of the month. Winter barley has been fully headed for several weeks, with warm and sunny conditions helping it along the way. It is anticipated that winter barley will begin to be harvested during the third or fourth week of July. That is slightly behind last season but in line with average recent harvests. Barley crops, especially those in southern Scotland, are showing promise of a reasonable yield with plenty of heads/m2 and plenty of grain sites/head.
Winter wheat crops are showing flag leaf, with some early crops beginning to display ear emergence, which is more in line with where we would expect to be at this point of the growing cycle. Again, crops appear to have a promising yield, so long as the weather stays favourable during the flowering and grain set stages.
Disease amongst crops isn’t a worry currently, but there are disease sources on the older leaves of the crops which could soon affect newer leaves if we have wet conditions. Most farmers have decided to protect the crops with a robust fungicide program, so they should be well protected against any late-season issues.
The potential outcome of spring barley crops is difficult to judge as there are more variable establishments across the country, with a notable North/South divide.
The current warm, sunny conditions are ideal for well-rooted, longer-established crops (generally in the South), but those sown a little later (those in the North) are still needing moisture to help them progress. If crops come under stress at this stage, some will abort tillers. If the crop is already light on plant numbers, it will exacerbate an already thin plant count and so affect yield potential.
Markets
The old crop grain market struggled in May and has developed one of the most difficult positions for years. With a lack of domestic interest in both wheat and barley, along with poor opportunities for export, grain values continued to slide downwards and are now well below where they were when the Ukraine war commenced.
Feed barley has proven to be particularly challenging to trade with very few interested buyers in the market. Some farm-to-farm business is keeping tonnes moving, but only in small parcel tonnages.
Ex-farm values are now below £150 ex-farm for the remaining old crop barley and even that is only if a home can be found for it. The wheat position is only marginally better with some very limited space available through July and early August for small bulks of tonnage. Currently, an ex-farm price for July of £185 would be deemed to be a good price and little likelihood of that getting anything other than worse. Given the amount of wheat still on farms, it is probable that many growers will be forced to carry tonnage through to new season markets.
With regard to new crop prices, values have decreased quite worryingly too. Feed barley is now trading at £158-£160 for Sept and feed wheat at around £195 for Sept. Given the cost of the inputs used for getting these crops to harvest, there can’t be much margin left to work with, if any.
Many farmers are now holding off selling any more tonnage into the new crop market but, since there are reports of good sowing conditions for corn in US along with promising wheat crops across western Europe, there currently doesn’t look like there are many reasons to expect any significant recovery in these markets. Much will depend once again on what happens in the Russia/Ukraine conflict which, as ever, is extremely difficult to judge.