Oil seed rape harvest was a little disappointing

And though the yields were a little disappointing due to the drought in early summer, we got the grain off dry and clean and the barley is in our home use bins to feed the cattle over winter.

Though we baled and cleared the OSR straw, unfortunately the rain came in and therefore we are unable to plant any winter oil seed rape this year.

We were going to be doing a one hectare companion crop trial, which involves planting vetches and clover alongside the winter oil seed rape. The vetches and clover protect the OSR and then die back over winter providing nutrients for the crop.

We sold the first batch of dairy bred bulls last week and they sold well.

All the bulls are growing well and we are looking for more weanling dairy bulls to come into the system. Mr Jarett collected his eight bulled stabiliser heifers at the end of last month; we have our own 16 heifers separated from the main group of cows and calves and they look well.

Well, we only have 74 lambs remaining to sell and we'll sell these in the fat and store sales over the next three weeks. This will free more grassland up for the ewes in the build up to tupping in mid October.

We bought some lovely yearling ewes from a prize-winning Lleyn flock near Skipton, West Yorkshire.

They look like they will make good sized ewes and because they have good frames, the lambs they produce should have some size and confirmation.

I also purchased a Sufftex ram from Hulmes of Ellesmere. He is a quarter New Zealand Texel and three quarters New Zealand Suffolk. The NZ breeding programmes select for lambing ease and so the rams tend to have a smaller head and shoulders compared with British genetics, which results in the lambs being easier to lamb.

There will be plenty of hybrid vigour as a result of the ram being a crossbreed and with the larger frame from the Suffolk, mixed with the better confirmation from the Texel.

I am hoping we will be producing a finished lamb with more meat cover and better saleability than we have been selling.

Kim and Oscar are back to school and nursery. Oscar started running around everywhere this last week. It seems amazing that the week before he was crawling and standing, and now he just runs which surprises me every time!

Here's hoping for a couple more hot dry weeks so that we can finish harvest and plant next year's crops.