Harvest is in! Yesterday saw the final crop harvested here at Hope Farm with our field beans combined on a glorious Cambridgeshire evening.
The completion of harvest is a time to celebrate, especially when it has been taken in dry as this year. This means there are no additional drying costs prior to selling or storage. But it is also a time of mixed emotions as all the effort of growing the crops over the last year has ended and the fields stand bare and seemingly lifeless. It is also signifies the end of the breeding season, with the skylarks, linnets and yellowhammers no longer singing.
There is little time for soul searching though. Some of next year's crops are growing already! Our oilseed rape is sown during the wheat harvest, using a technique known as autocasting. As the wheat was harvested some weeks ago, the oilseed rape is now beginning to germinate. A little rain at just the right moment has helped.
We are also growing mustard, which has also germinated, on fields which will be planted with field beans next February. The mustard allows us to protect the bare soils from being eroded by winter rain and acts as a green fertiliser.
I mentioned lifeless, but on closer inspection the fields are far from lifeless. Coveys of partridges can be seen on the cultivated fields, flocks of goldfinches and linnets fly overhead and the hedges are full of birds.
Many of the hedgerow birds at this time of year, such as whitethroats and blackcaps, are already migrating. They are quite noisy as you approach. It is far from a lifeless farm, it is actually buzzing with life. Even though the excitement of harvest is over, the excitement of migration and winter flocks building up is only just starting.