Tag: soil

Mixed Soil Farmer of the Year 2022 – Farm walk with Billy Lewis

Our 2022 Mixed Soil Farmer of the Year, Billy Lewis, is based at Boycefield Farm in Herefordshire on a 350 acre beef and sheep farm. The farm soils are medium loamy with areas of heavy clay. Billy’s business includes around 100 head of pedigree Hereford cattle, a flock of 300 ewes and an additional arable enterprise. In October 2022 over 100 farmers, advisors and industry personnel met at Boycefield to learn more about the system that led Billy to win the competition.

Approach

Billy’s approach was historically sympathetic and typical of many mixed farms, with grassland alongside an arable area used to produce crops and fodder to raise livestock. However previous management on the arable land has seen some degradation through root crops in the rotation, in particular lifting potatoes in the wet harvest of 2008 and grass yields were stagnant. Over the past 5 years the farm has seen some radical changes with regards to soil management and, consequently, this has improved profitability in both the arable and grassland systems with reduced requirement for artificial inputs. Billy has transitioned away from renting land for potatoes and a predominantly high-input, plough based-system on the arable side, and an overall reliance on bagged nitrogen across the whole farm.

Now management is focused on a direct drilling regime, living mulches, catch and cover cropping alongside integrating livestock into the arable system to maintain diversity throughout the farm. Furthermore, the grazing platform has developed from a field-by-field rotational grazing system over the past 3 years to that of a high-impact, long recovery mob grazing approach; transitioning from monoculture grass leys into diverse herbal and legume leys with added natural regeneration of plants within the historic seedbank, resulting in a near total removal of artificial nitrogen requirement. 

The Soil Farmer of the Year farm walk at Boycefield Farm, Herefordshire. Exploring the management and system used by Billy Lewis, our Mixed Farm winner of 2022’s competition.

Speaking to the group, Billy described his process in altering the management undertaken at the farm,

“The first year we started putting up a few electric fences over a small area to try rotational grazing. Alongside this we tried around 5 acres of direct drilling. As these two approaches worked quite well the year after we increased the area and so on and so forth.”

The focus at Boycefield is upon building soil health and quality to increase the resilience of the system (either grassland or arable) alongside a capacity to utilise the nutrients already available below the ground,

“Our approach on the farm is to use what we have on the farm – sun, rain and the soil – if we get the soil right then in theory everything should fall into line.”

To aid this Billy has an integrated system whereby all of the farm with the exception of the permanent pasture will rotate between arable and forage cropping, with livestock featured throughout regardless of what is planted,

“We tend to have three years of cereals with grazable cover or catch crops followed by three years in grass or herbal leys to build the fertility – this is either silaged or grazed depending on what is required for the year”.

Maximising above and below-ground diversity is central to the management approach at Boycefield farm, cover and catch crops are used throughout the arable system allowing livestock to feature throughout the rotation.

Much of the permanent pasture is zero input, without cultivation or additional manures outside of what is deposited during grazing from animal impact, Billy explains,

“Since beginning our rotational grazing system we no longer apply fertiliser to our permanent pasture. You will grow ten times more grass with an electric fence than you will with a bag of fertiliser”.

Across Boycefield farm fertiliser use has been reduced by more than 50% over the last three years,

“The ultimate aim is to no longer use pesticides or artificial fertilisers.”

Conversion to mob grazing

Historically fields were set stocked, Billy believed that this was a main blocker on the potential biodiversity of the farm. A mob grazing system with long rest periods allows the natural seedbank within the soil to regenerate. The cattle are on a 48 hour system, whereby they are moved into a new paddock every two days with each paddock being grazed around 5 times throughout the summer season. 

Billy demonstrates his grazing system, utilising the approach of graze a third, leave a third and trample a third,

“The livestock are kept happy with the grass available, whilst the plants left have leaf area to continue photosynthesising and the remaining third which is trampled in is boosting the below-ground biology.”

The farm utilises a leader-follower system, where the sheep graze in-front with the cattle following behind; this allows the sheep to take the majority of the lush and tall grass which is less suitable for the Hereford cattle, which perform better on the permanent or older grass pastures. On a particularly tricky year with the drought Billy discussed how this system had fared,

“It has become apparent that this is the method we should be using to grow grass, fields we went into with high covers recovered faster with ground moisture being maintained alongside that remaining leaf area.”

Although the system is based on 48 hour moves between paddocks, Billy keeps this flexible – altering the area available in cases such as holidays or in the extreme heat to allow for better shading,

“The grazing system is a balancing act between your own life and the farm life – I don’t get too hung up on moving animals or having a set plan so we can adapt to the season, the demands of the animals and the ground”.

In regards to the performance of the livestock, Billy shares,

“The stock know that every 2 to 3 days they will be moved to fresh grass – they are calm, happy and well. The cattle have a lovely shine to their coats and lambs are performing really well on a purely forage based diet.”

On the farm tour Billy demonstrated his rotational grazing system to the group, showing how livestock are moved on a 48 hour system to a new paddock and fresh grazing. 

Cattle are wormed a week prior to turn-out when in the shed but treatment is not repeated – Billy relies on regular movement and an increased sward height to reduce the parasitic worm burden and likewise increase the dung beetle population through minimising anthelmintics onto the pasture. Billy mentions that a group of lambs made it to market this year without a single worming treatment, he explains,

“We would never not treat an animal if we thought the need was there, however, with our system worming is no longer a high priority – the animals tend to stay ahead of them and therefore have much lower contact.”

Focusing on soil health has helped Billy grow far more forage, aiding livestock performance and the recovery of pastures to extend the grazing season.

Compost

Cattle are housed over winter and all of the resulting farmyard manure is composted and then used on the arable fields, either into a standing crop in the spring or prior to drilling in the autumn. Billy describes,

“With compost it is a case of little and often.”

Adapting the compost to field requirement, Billy has previously added solid digestate fibre to his compost mix to increase the nutrient content available. All of the straw from the arable system is baled to use in the livestock, however it is then returned via the compost which Billy sees as far more beneficial to the soil and crop being grown. The compost is produced through windrowing the muck and using a compost turner to mix, around about 4 to 5 times before the finished product is realised – being much more in texture to that of the soil, being capable of spreading around 24m at a rate of 6-10 tonnes per hectare. 

Boycefield Farm produces pedigree Hereford Cattle, with 2022 marking the bicentenary of the Lewis family breeding herd.

Diversity and reducing inputs

The group looked at an arable field that was just coming out of the three year fertility break – consequently the field has been planted with a three-way blend of wheat (Extase, Costello and Graham) using a direct drill. The seed used is currently dressed, however in the coming years Billy looks to minimise this,

“We are aiming to have half of the wheat undressed next year, we have wireworm within the soils but are yet to see worrying levels of damage – there is so much variety in the soils and also in what we are growing above ground, they don’t seem to bother with the crop”.

Billy uses contractors for some of the cultivation and spraying work, so minimising the number of passes required equally reduces the overall spend requirement for the crop. The field was sprayed off with glyphosate at 2.5 l/ha with 0.5 l/ha of fulvic acid and 80g of citric acid, which left a clover understorey to act as a living mulch for the combinable crops. Billy explains,

“Traditionally I wouldn’t go out of my way to establish clover in an arable crop, but as it is already here and very well established I will capitalise on it. We have done it the last three years and seen some good successes.”

He continues,

“As much diversity you can get in a system the better, in what is usually a monoculture crop of wheat we now have clover roots and three different varieties”.

Billy now manages clover understories within his arable rotation, providing extensive benefits in crop nutrition, water infiltration and soil health.

When looking at a field which has had a clover understorey for the past two seasons Billy explains his method,

“Originally this was wheat direct drilled into a herbal ley and the clover persisted, after harvest we then direct drilled some more mustard and phacelia in to provide some different rooting architecture and sheep grazing. We grazed around 70 sheep for 10 days on the field which could take back the green cover before we have now planted our second wheat.”

Billy uses Humber Palmers fertiliser in a three way split, of roughly 10kg in March and then a following 20kg later in the season before the final dose which is applied as a foliar with humates. The fertiliser program going forward is much reduced to the traditional application rate, Billy explains,

“We are budgeting 50 kg of nitrogen per hectare for this wheat crop, last year the wheat with a living mulch had 60 kg of nitrogen per hectare and one fungicide at T2 and yielded over 10 t/ha, making it likely the most profitable crop of wheat we’ve ever grown on the farm. Therefore it would be nice to go zero fungicide this year and reduce the fertiliser rate further, however if the crop is looking stressed or like it needs more we would always consider increasing the inputs.”

Having livestock available to the arable system keeps management flexible, with Billy having the capacity to graze particularly forward crops to reduce the requirement for fungicides later in the season.

Restoring soil health with cover cropping

The walk visited one of the poorest fields on the farm, which is currently undergoing a process to restore soil quality, health and fertility. Billy explained to the group,

“We started in here with a winter cover crop which was grazed off by lambs intended to go into spring barley. However the field was still very poor and with the current fertiliser prices we didn’t feel like we would get anything other than a marginal crop – so instead we planted a summer cover crop (buckwheat, phacelia, mustard, chicory, oats, crimson clover, rye, vetch) and focussed on restoring the soil to a position where the field could function in our low-input system.”

The field has now been direct drilled with a GS4 herbal ley as part of the farm’s stewardship scheme, with a planned winter grazing to remove any remaining plants from the summer cover crop – anything that is left within the herbal ley will be seen as a bonus to the overall diversity. 

One of the fields at Boycefield currently in a GS4 herbal ley as part of a fertility building strategy to improve soil functionality before returning to the arable rotation.

Further explaining the cover cropping system, Billy showed the group a previous oat stubble with freshly drilled winter wheat,

“This field had compost in the spring for the oat crop, straight after combining we establish a catch crop (mustard, buckwheat and phacelia) with a disc drill to create a little tilth and allow any weeds to chit. This catch crop will be in the ground for 6-7 weeks to capture the sunlight and keep the soil life ticking over and cycling nutrients before we desiccate it and drill the following crop.”

Upon digging a hole, Billy mentions,

“When we have been out digging we have noticed some phenomenal plant Rhizosheaths, most noticeably in our cover crops where the plant roots are absolutely laden in soil. This is a great sign, it shows us that our soil biology is functioning and forming great symbiotic relationships with the crop.”

He continues,

“When we dig up any legume species, be it in a herbal ley, cover crop or in the clover living mulch, we’re seeing plenty of nodules forming and more importantly we are noticing that they are active due to the dark purple colour when they are sliced open.”

Moving forward

The next steps at Boycefield are to reduce input usage further, focusing on utilising what is available on the farm. Billy has now taken on additional local arable land after demonstrating the benefits of a more regenerative, resilient system. Boycefield has started running a number of farm walks throughout the year to show other visitors what they are up to.

Follow Billy

Equally, Billy shares the daily goings on for the farm on twitter (@BoycefieldFarm) and on the Boycefield Farm website – a great platform to see all of the wonderful photos of the farm throughout the year. 

FCT and Yeo Valley at Countryside COP2

On the 10th October Farm Carbon Toolkit’s Becky Willson and Liz Bowles co-led an event kindly hosted at Yeo Valley Organic Garden as part of the second Countryside COP (CCOP2).

Countryside COP is a hybrid conference held to align with COP to create space for the agricultural sector and rural economies to push ahead on climate change and sustainability. It was established to allow rural communities to come together and illustrate the opportunities that are available, along with contributions that are already underway to reach net zero. The event is also an opportunity to explore adaptation options, something of increasing importance as our weather patterns become more extreme, as seen so starkly seen this year. 

The first Countryside COP was set up in 2021 by the Agriculture & Land Use Alliance (formerly Greenhouse Gas Action Plan GHGAP). Organisations in the Alliance include:

  • ADAS
  • Agricultural Engineers Association (AEA)
  • Agriculture & Horticulture Development Board (AHDB)
  • Agricultural Industries Confederation (AIC)
  • Country Land & Business Association (CLA)
  • Linking Environment & Farming (LEAF)
  • NIAB
  • National Farmers Union (NFU)

In an NFU article leading up to Countryside COP1 the Alliance said

“This journey is complex, but there is no shortage of professionalism and knowledge within the rural community, and all who support food and farming. This is the time to utilise and invest in this expertise so we can help contribute to the government’s net-zero target, all while continuing to produce fantastic, affordable food for people at home and abroad”.

This year Farm Carbon Toolkit was one of a range of organisations including universities and farming bodies contributing to CCOP2. Through a plethora of 15 events running from the 10th-14th October all across the UK CCOP2 speakers were hosted from as far afield as Australia, Ghana and Zambia.

At Farm Carbon Toolkit we teamed up with our project partners at Yeo Valley who kindly hosted us, to talk about making the transition towards regenerative agriculture and about the findings so far in the project. The event was attended by a range of participants including farmers, education providers, NGOs and the general public. 

FCT’s event on ‘Soil Health and Water Security’ discussed the benefits that agroforestry can bring to grassland systems. It was demonstrated that the presence of trees can buffer extreme weather conditions such as the drought experienced this summer by supporting grass growth and therefore livestock performance, as it has done at Yeo Valley. Agroforestry can enable soils to retain more moisture, limiting the impacts of both droughts and flooding, so has a direct climate change mitigation potential.

Other findings demonstrated at the event included discussing how research carried out with Yeo Valley farmers has suggested that soil management practices, such as growing herbal leys, can increase soil carbon deposition below 10cm. The amount of carbon this is sequestering due to the range of practice uptake on trial sites is significant – it demonstrates a carbon stock improvement of between 20-40t/c/ha.

The event also showcased how significant discussions and events like this one can be in improving carbon literacy amongst attendees, crucial in moving forward together.

To read more about the other events in the series and the insightful recommendations that came from them please see here.

Our latest upgrade to the Farm Carbon Calculator

Today the Farm Carbon Calculator has gone live with a major upgrade. As part of our development cycle, every few months we deliver updates to ensure our calculator keeps up with the latest science, while also improving its features and usability. As the number of users continues to rise, we  regularly  update the tool to ensure it’s the best it can be and matches our users’ expectations.

The recent COP26 exemplified how carbon has shot up the agenda for everyone in societies across the world, and this fact is reflected in the number of farmers and growers we are engaging with at the Farm Carbon Toolkit. We have been advocating for over ten years that farmers and growers have a key role in cutting emissions and indeed in sequestering carbon in their biomass and soils, and we provide solutions for users to measure and manage carbon in their businesses. 

Farms are one of just two industrial sectors that can not just reduce emissions but also sequester carbon (the other being forestry). This means farming can play a positive role in the climate crisis by potentially drawing down atmospheric CO2 into its soils and biomass. Facing the climate crisis, we are here to support farmers and growers to make a positive contribution, as we all must do.

What’s changed

In this upgrade we have updated a wide range of emissions factors based on the latest research; including in Fuels, Livestock, Fertilisers, Crops, and Materials. This means up-to-date figures, more categories and therefore increased accuracy.

Major changes include a larger range of fertilisers, a huge range of branded sprays to choose from, a new way of recording livestock numbers – giving much more useful outputs, more animal feeds, new animal bedding section, a much greater range of bought in manures, and upgraded factors in fuels, electricity and travel.

There are new user features including an improved way of recording yields of crops, more FAQs to help you through the process, and videos to support you in filling in the Calculator.

On the Report Summary page, the emissions are now broken down into Scopes 1, 2 and 3, which makes Company Reporting easier and clearer. We’ve also separated results for carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, so users can understand which greenhouse gases make up their total carbon footprint. 

A brand new feature, and a great compliment to Carbon, is a way to measure Nitrogen. Thanks to funding from the WWF, and in conjunction with the Soil Association, our new ‘Nitrogen Module’ allows users to visualise the nitrogen flows in and out of their farm system. Nitrogen (N) inputs are built up from biological fixation, synthetic fertilisers and organic manures as well as purchased livestock and animal feeds. The N output is calculated from in-field N2O emissions as well as crops, milk and livestock sold and the N balance calculation provides an overview of the net change of Nitrogen over the year. 

The new Nitrogen Module shows overviews and details of the flows of N in and out of the farm

The process

It takes several months of work to prepare for an upgrade. We plan, prioritise, research, extract figures, build new functionality, review, then test, test and test again! 

The Calculator team is already planning the next update, which is scheduled for late February 2022. We will be working to update a raft of more emissions factors, reviewing the latest science (which is changing quite rapidly), and working on even more user features. Which all means that in another three months the Calculator will take an even bigger leap forward!

The Calculator can be used on all types of farms, including livestock, arable and horticulture

Working with consultants, larger companies and organisations

The Calculator will always be free for farmers and growers to use. But increasingly we have a new group of users who want to use the Calculator within their supply chains and as part of a consultancy service. 

For consultants advising farmers, we offer a licensing service, where they can receive training and access to the Calculator to calculate the carbon footprint of their clients, and deliver advice upon the results. For businesses and organisations managing groups of farmers and growers – such as buying groups, co-ops and larger food businesses, we offer a white label version of the Calculator. This is branded and tailored to the user, along with support from us, and a group admin function to manage and compare group users’ data.

Finding out more

We hope you find the Farm Carbon Calculator useful for your business, and take steps to reduce your carbon footprint. You can use the Toolkit for further help, advice and case studies https://farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk/toolkit

For help and advice on how to use the Calculator, visit our webpage https://calculator.farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk/ 

For information on commercial licenses and white label versions, please contact us calculator@farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk 

Launch of Guide on Monitoring Soil Carbon

We’re pleased to announce the launch of a new guide for monitoring soil carbon. This practical field, farm and lab guide aims to answer key questions for robust on-farm field monitoring of soil carbon and associated indicators of soil health.

This guide has been produced as part of the Soil Carbon project and written in collaboration with Duchy College, Plymouth University, Rothamsted Research and the Farm Carbon Toolkit. It is designed and printed with kind support from the Farm Net Zero project, funded by the National Lottery Climate Action Fund.

Who is it for?

This practical guide is relevant to farmers seeking to measure and understand their soil carbon stocks – as well as landowners, advisors and researchers.

Supply chains and organisations seeking to reward farmers for improving soil carbon stocks will also find this guide helpful. However it should be noted that it’s not written as a formal standard or detailed protocol. The guide will be accompanied with detailed supplementary materials stemming from the ERDF Agri-Tech Cornwall funded “Soil Carbon Project”(2018 to 2021).

Why is this important?

Robust estimates of soil carbon stocks can be complicated. Not least because soil carbon levels are constantly in-flux with in-field variation. Estimates are also heavily influenced by the way in which we collect, process and analyse soil samples. In the Soil Carbon project, we’ve been working with research partners to investigate how soil carbon estimates are influenced by variables such as when the samples are taken, how many samples are taken and at what pattern across the field.

What does the guide cover?

The guide consists of answers to the following core questions:

  1. When to conduct your soil carbon sampling?
  2. What fields to select on your farm?
  3. How to sample within those fields?
  4. At what depths should samples be taken?
  5. How often should you repeat your sampling?
  6. How to collect and prepare your samples?
  7. What are the options for the lab analyses?
  8. What are the main soil health indicators that should be monitored?
  9. What are the outputs and benefits?

The role of soil carbon in natural climate solutions – new paper released

A new paper has been released in Nature Sustainability this month which highlights the potential for soil carbon sequestration as a climate solution. You can access the full paper here. The abstract is below.

Mitigating climate change requires clean energy and the removal of atmospheric carbon. Building soil carbon is an appealing way to increase carbon sinks and reduce emissions owing to the associated benefits to agriculture. However, the practical implementation of soil carbon climate strategies lags behind the potential, partly because we lack clarity around the magnitude of opportunity and how to capitalize on it. Here we quantify the role of soil carbon in natural (land-based) climate solutions and review some of the project design mechanisms available to tap into the potential. We show that soil carbon represents 25% of the potential of natural climate solutions (total potential, 23.8 Gt of CO2-equivalent per year), of which 40% is protection of existing soil carbon and 60% is rebuilding depleted stocks.

Soil carbon comprises 9% of the mitigation potential of forests, 72% for wetlands and 47% for agriculture and grasslands.

Soil carbon is important to land-based efforts to prevent carbon emissions, remove atmospheric carbon dioxide and deliver ecosystem services in addition to climate mitigation.