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Diary - December 2011 
It’s hard to believe, with Christmas just around the corner that another year has passed on the farm. 2011 started cold and frosty with snow on the ground. Completing the last of harvesting and delivering of the 2010 Sugar Beet crop was very challenging. Although sugar percentages had been affected we were lucky to deliver the entire crop, unlike other growers further north. By contrast, the winter to date has been much milder with no sign of significant snow or frost in the run up to Christmas. Our haulier Duncan has worked hard since the opening of the sugar factory at the end of September meaning that the 2011 crop will be delivered by Christmas. We will hit budgeted yields with average sugar percentages around 18.3%. Stephen has been busy scaring pigeons from Oilseed Rape crops this month and Andrew will complete the remainder of the ploughing by the end of this week. We welcomed Chris Cosgrove, a new full time member to the team at the start of the month and we hope he enjoys his time with us. A large proportion of seed potatoes have now been delivered and are safely in store some of which we be put into trays for sprouting in the New Year. We will be trimming a proportion of our hedges over the next two months as part of our hedgerow management plan. Hedges are trimmed either every 2 or 3 years to enable plentiful berry production in the intervening years. Hedges are our bird feeders! We recently received RSPB bird survey data for one of our farms. We have each farm surveyed every 3-4 years by a RSPB volunteer. Three surveys are carried out between April and June. The first time this particular farm was surveyed in 2007 we had 35 species. We were pleased to see that this has increased to 48 this year. Extra species noted include ones of conservation concern such as Bullfinch, Corn Bunting, Green Woodpecker, Kestrel, Lapwing, Mistle Thrush, Sparrow Hawk, Swift, White Throat and Yellow Wagtail. This is encouraging to see as we entered this farm into Entry Level Scheme in 2007 and that the areas we have managed within this are increasing the numbers of species on that particular farm. We are aiming to continue bird surveys next year at our Hinxton Farm. Finally, we would like to wish you a very Happy Christmas from everyone at Russell Smith Farms. Andrew Nottage |
