Peter Trickett |
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was my father who proved very persuasive. I’ d had no agricultural training and when I told him I didn’ t know anything about farming he said‘ all you need to do is read Farmers Weekly for a year and you’ ll know as much as everyone else.’ While there may be an element of truth in that I have always wanted to make clear rational decisions. I became quite heavily involved with the NFU in the eighties and early nineties and was a Nuffield scholar in 1992.
“ Simon and I farmed together after father passed away in 1995 with Simon handling the dairy side while I was responsible for the pigs and arable concern. Things went well and we had a very good year in 1996 but after that the milk price fell dramatically. We had a review by consultants who suggested we should either rationalise and reinvest in the dairy operation with
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a newer milking parlour, improved housing and a new slurry system or get out. We chose not to spend the money and in 1999 we sold up the herd. We had come to a similar decision on pigs prior to that as reinvestment was needed due to the looming sow stalls ban. My brother quit farming when the cows went.
“ We had only really started taking arable more seriously in 1984, when the milk quotas came in, and in 1997 I attended an advanced course in farm business management run by the Worshipful Company of Farmers at Wye College. My intention was that it would focus my mind on future plans. I knew changes were in the offing and the increasing arable nature of the farm was something that I enjoyed. I had options in my mind but I was looking for the business skills that would enable me to think about decisions rationally.
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“ I came away from the threeweek residential course feeling good about farming and that there was a huge future. I then just needed to work out what was best for our situation.”
Circumstances subsequently assisted Peter when the dairy and pig prices plummeted and Simon made his decision, but Peter’ s first year of the farming operation being wholly devoted to crops was to be just as challenging as it had been with cows and pigs.
“ I remember selling barley at £ 51 per tonne! It was a bad year all round. The year 2000 was such a wet harvest. We had that much grain that we had it heaped up outside and then the rain came. The grain dryer was breaking down every night. We had to abandon wheat straw in the fields and we didn’ t finish combining until October. We had only been able to afford to keep on one man when we went wholly arable and that
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year it was myself, our one man and my wife Amanda who did everything. The river flooded and washed away what we drilled. We had put hundreds of tonnes of grain in the silage shed and the whole river went through it to a depth of two feet.”
From that inauspicious and frankly nightmarish start Peter and Amanda have now settled into the arable way of life. The farmhouse and buildings of Mill Farm were taken in hand by estate and a new grain store was built at Fortshot where Peter and Amanda have lived for many years.
“ The grain store was cofunded by us and Harewood Estate. It is now a fabulous shed with state-of-the-art drying floors and equipment.
“ Our land is very variable. It’ s nearly all Grade 3 arable with some Grade 4 but in 2015 we averaged 5 tonnes per acre for our wheat and it all achieved
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