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Lucinda says the farm ’ s commitment to reducing inputs and its carbon footprint and lately reducing its new work at reducing methane output from the cattle through a mineral approved by the Scottish Agricultural College shows how much that the farm is moving in the right direction .
“ It ’ s a prime example of how the farm is seeking to work the right way . Anything that can be done to work effectively and properly is what John and Will try to do here .
“ The farm ’ s cropping includes grass , winter wheat , barley , beans , oilseed rape , maize , fodder beet and rye . They more than satisfy any 3-crop rule and every crop has its place in the crop rotation .
One direction Lucinda says she thought she would never see at Marishes was direct drill .
“ I thought I would never have seen direct drilling on this farm because it ’ s heavy land . The clue is in the name of where we are , Marishes . They ’ ve tried different sorts and currently have a Horsch drill .
“ It has proved a huge cost saving on the amount of diesel
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consumption , which has dropped massively . If direct drilling has worked here on heavy land , then I ’ m pretty sure it can provide opportunities for cost saving on other farms elsewhere that face similarly challenging conditions .
“ The arable rotation also includes cover crops and field margins . The farm is in a mid-tier stewardship scheme . We have yet to see exactly how the new environmental land management schemes ( ELMS ) will alter what is being done here .
Lucinda says that there are two other elements that have provided the farm with greater business resilience in the form of power generation , plus other benefits received from the diversified interests .
“ The farm uses digestate from the anaerobic digestate ( AD ) plant on the farm and that this has reduced the amount of bought-in , manufactured fertiliser as well as providing another diversification income and saving in heating costs .
“ The AD plant was put in about seven years ago in 2015 . It is a 500kw plant . It is a joint venture
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agreement with a venture capital company that has AD plants all over the country , and it sees John and Will as the operators of the plant rather than having had to put in the capital .
“ The farm also has a 250kw wind turbine . There were a few issues in getting it through planning . One objection was its size but when it went to the planning inspectorate they said it should never have reached them because it was even smaller than the rollercoaster at Flamingoland nearby .
“ The bank manager was loving it when he asked about how the farm was reducing its carbon
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footprint and John and Will told of how they ’ d reduced litres per hectare used on machinery ; how they had invested in new machinery that uses less fuel ; cover crops ; and digestate , especially the part about what goes into the AD plant is not a food versus fuel argument because the vast majority that goes in is the muck from the cattle .
Some of Lucinda ’ s priorities with the CLA
Over in Wensleydale , near Aysgarth Falls , where Lucinda ’ s parents farm it is a very different farming enterprise and having first-hand experience of both Yorkshire Dales National Park farming and Vale of Pickering farmland means that in her still relatively new position as CLA North Regional Director Lucinda can see how things differ firsthand from one type of farm to the next .
“ My parents farm extensively and as efficiently as possible . Their farm fits well into what the government pointed out about providing funds for land that delivers a public good . I think we have about five public footpaths across our farm and an area of land has open access .
“ The thing with the government ’ s rolling out of its new countryside incentives is that until the details are out in full people such as my parents are delivering public goods but have no monetary value attributed to them .
“ I ’ ve been in my new position with the CLA for 20 months and there is still so much uncertainty in the reductions of the BPS . We ’ ve still not had enough information regards what new schemes are going to be going forward .
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