United Kingdom
October 18, 2016
Celia Diepenbroek and the team from Ashdown Farm, near Seaton, Devon are the latest additions to our Grass into Gold programme.
Over the course of the next year, Celia, Ben, Sam and Doeke Diepenbroek will work closely with Latham Gibbins from Barenbrug, who lives in Dorset. Together, Latham and the team will make improvements to several fields at the family’s second property, Bonehayne Farm, located in the Axe Valley, close to Colyton.
Work has already begun with Latham offering the team guidance, information and practical support on the renovation of two fields requiring reseeding. Both fields were suffering because of the presence of docks and previous soil poaching, which can occur when cattle are turned out for an extended period of time. Across both of the farms the Diepenbroek family has 600 cows, which spend most of their time outside grazing under a rotational system. Each cow produces around 6000 litres of milk per annum, which is subsequently sold to one of the country’s biggest dairy cooperatives.
Recognising that the two fields in question needed attention, Latham advised ploughing them up and reseeding with DAIRY GRAZER and EARLY CUT AND GRAZE - a move that will pay dividends next spring. Latham recommended reseeding after using our field indexing system to grade the team’s grass. This simple means of rating grass quality uses a ‘one to five’ sliding scale; fields that rate five are considered highly productive while swards that score one are deemed in need of immediate action. With less than 40% of productive grass species and more than 40% weed content or gaps, the fields scored around two.
Latham Gibbins, South & South West Area Manager, said: “We are delighted to welcome Celia and her team to our growing group of Grass into Gold farmers. In the last few weeks - at the Grass into Gold farms that signed up last year - we’ve started to see some good results as the first cuts have been made.”
“This time next year we’ll hopefully be seeing the same results on Celia’s fields. The Ashdown farm is now under a very efficient pasture-utilisation, rotational system and grass utilisation across the board is very good. Now it’s about making sure that the fields across the farm are up to a high standard and producing maximum results. “Obviously we want to make the fields a five on our pasture performance scale and then help maintain that level. At the upper end of our indexing system, fields that score a four or a five are highly productive and need minimal maintenance so the return on investment is far better. All that’s required to maintain this is regular soil monitoring for the first few years to check on pH and nutrient levels, then - further down the line - some overseeding as the swards mature.”
Commenting Celia said: “I signed up to Grass into Gold after hearing a friend of Latham’s mention it - and I’ve been really impressed with the help he’s provided in the first phase. I’ve been wanting to get more from my grass for some time so it’s great to be working closely with an expert who can provide some really clear pointers. Long term, anything we learn at Bonehayne, can also be applied to the home farm too - meaning the benfits of taking part in the programme will be two-fold.”
At Bonehayne Farm, Celia has a paddock grazing platform of 190 acres with 200 cows and at the Ashdown farm, the platform is 311 acres with 400 cows. Also, both units are supported by an additional 240 acres of away ground.
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