“Had we still been ploughing now, we would’ve had two or three terrible seasons and lots of soil damage. The way I farm now has softened that blow. I wouldn’t want to be cultivating the land like we used to.”
Jayne Arnold is a grower who is really pushing the boundaries of soil health and mamagement. Based on a 12 acre organic vegetable farm in Worcestershire, she is constantly striving to find ways to improve the diversity, depth, quality and carbon content of their soils. Growing for their own veg box scheme, the farm also has a few sheep, an orchard, agroforestry and makes plenty of compost.
In this new Case Study, we learn how Oxton Organics is balancing a productive far, producing local food, whilst constantly improving soil health and quality through a voracious appetite for knowledge and an approach
Drilling green manures between salad crops
Whilst the farm has been organic for a long time, it’s only in the last 7-8 years that this new approach to soil management started, producing some really impressive results. The approach is underpinned by applying high quality compost, biostimulants, and covering the soil as much as possible through mulches, compost and green manures.
The sheep play an important role, and the pastures they’re on have improved significantly since the species mix and stocking regime has changed. This has resulted in not just better pastures and better soil helath, but much more biodiversity too, as Jayne notes:
“In the years after sowing the pasture it was predominantly grasses, white clover, and yarrow, with a little ribwort, burnet and yellow trefoil. Now there is much more diversity there are flowers throughout summer and autumn, including dandelions, wild carrot, yarrow, knapweed, oxeye daisy and much more. A few bee orchids and pyramidal orchid appeared four years ago and returned every year since. We had never seen orchids on the farm before! Butterflies and other pollinating insects are also more abundant.”
Biodiverse pastures at Oxton Organics
Wildlife abounds above and below ground, from the tall hedges and lines of willow coppice, to the flowers of the pastures and the cropland soil teeming with life. “There are so many worms in the soil, it’s hard to avoid them when transplanting crops!” Jayne says.
Soil Organic Matter levels are rising, and distributing more evenly through the soil profile. Structure is improving, soil colouration is more even and deeper through the profile. The action of worms and perennial plants helps to draw carbon down in the soil profile – and that means it is also more stable. Carbon sequestered in to the soil like this is a proper drawdown of atmospheric carbon; if it’s not released then it is stable and locked away.
An example of a deep rooting and diverse green manure mix, in one of the polytunnels
Jayne notes that weather patterns have changed, with more frequent extreme rainfall events. “The up and downness of the weather has changed a lot“, she says. Building resilience in the stability of farm soils is essential in helping to mitigate such risks that all growers are experiencing from a changing climate. Soils that are higher in carbon, have a mulch or living cover, and have better structure will be much more resilient to the effects of both heavy rain and drought.
The farm’s focus on soil management underpins all the positive aspects outputs of the farm – quality food, flood resilience, carbon sequestration, biodiversity, and indeed sheer enjoyment and intrigue that gets growers out of bed in the morning. A refreshing look at green manures, founded on experience and observation, demonstrates one example of this: “you won’t build a fungal dominant soil with legumes. Plants will reject mycorrhizal associations if there’s too much Nitrogen in the system. You need to build bacteria that naturally fix Nitrogen and be more balanced. You don’t see many legumes in the hedgerow – yet that’s all green” says Jayne.
Mycorrhizal fungi associating with a radish
Managing carbon is also part of the business strategy, using an electric van for deliveries, minimising any cultivations, ensuring lots of carbon sequestration, and reducing inputs. With so much carbon being absorbed on the farm and being turned in to soil organic matter, the farm is really demonstrating how to grow in a way that builds capital for the future whilst producing great quality food and continuing to explore and push the boundaries.
Sheep grazing in the pastures at Oxton Organics
With thanks to Jayne Arnold for the photos and the interview. Written by Jonathan Smith.
Thousands have already used The Farm Carbon Calculator in Scotland to generate a carbon footprint of their farm. You may be required to receive a Carbon Audit under the Whole Farm Plan guidance and be aware that the first Audits are to be completed by by 15 May 2025 – get started for free.
We’ve brought as much of the guidance you need together in one place so that farmers, growers and crofters in Scotland feel confident to get started.
Learn more in our upcoming webinar – Carbon Audit Pro
Perfect for farmers and farm professionals in Scotland looking to understand how The Farm Carbon Calculator can help deliver Carbon Audits – at any scale.
There are around 51,000 farms in Scotland, and agricultural land makes up almost 80% of the area. Not all farms will want, or need a carbon audit, but we want to ensure as many as possible can get one for free if they want, or from a consultant, using The Farm Carbon Calculator.
In Scotland the receipt of future payments from the Scottish Government are dependent partly on the requirement that farms generate what they call a Carbon Audit – or what we term your farm’s carbon footprint. You can use several tools to complete this task – provided they meet criteria set out in the guidance and are compliant with PAS2050:
The Farm Carbon Calculator
Agrecalc
Cool Farm Tool
Solagro (JRC) Carbon Calculator.
Useful to note, if you think you already have a carbon footprint it is likely that this will be accepted by the SGRPID. These might be delivered to you as part of a UK supply chain contract (via the dairy, someone you supply, or supermarket agreements), by the Farm Advisory Service, as part of the Farm Business Survey, or from the Soil Association Exchange. Ask them for a copy – it’s your farm data after all and you will need this in case of inspection later.
We think there are many good reasons why you might want to do a carbon footprint but lets look first at what the benefits are as set out in the Whole Farm Plan.
What is the Whole Farm Plan?
Carbon Audits are part of Whole Farm Plan (WFP) guidance. Most farmers in Scotland are by now familiar with the WFP. It is designed encourage a comprehensive view of your farm or croft which should allow you to assess current performance, identify growth opportunities, and align practices with Scotland’s climate and nature goals.
Looking towards 15 May 2028, farmers seeking to claim Basic Payment Scheme payments will be required to implement the following key activities and plans:
Animal Health and Welfare Plan – reviewed annually
Biodiversity Audit – reviewed every 5 years
Carbon Audit – reviewed every 5 years
Integrated Pest Management Plan – reviewed annually
Soil Sampling of Region 1 land – every sampled field reviewed once every 5 years.
By 15 May 2025 all farms and crofts would need to have completed 2 out of the 5 audits. For all farms, one of these must be a carbon audit. We are working to ensure your carbon audit is one of the easier tasks to complete. Check the eligibility criteria in the guidance carefully to ensure you only complete audits which are required for you, and bear in mind the guidance can change. Read more
At the time of this article in March 2025 we understand that the audits required for 2026 (presumed to be required by 15 May 2026) will be made known in summer 2025 and announced as part of the Agricultural Reform Programme route map to give you time to prepare. We will revise this information as we learn more.
What we know so far is that by 2028 at the latest, all businesses will need to have all plans and audits that are applicable to their business in place.
There is lots here to take in in the above, especially if you have not undertaken any of the above activities yet. We are here to help so make sure you ask us questions if you have any.
Useful links– Whole Farm Plan
Whole Farm Plan guidance can change, or be amended in the annexes and ‘guidance updates’. We recommend you also read and become familiar with the available guidance at the following links:
Annex L: Carbon Audits including seasonal land – more specific guidance about what areas to include in your audit. Follow this note as it may differ from information you read within our Calculator guidance elsewhere
We know navigating these requirements can be challenging, but that’s where our team steps in. The Farm Carbon Calculator is free for farmers and we’re here to provide dedicated support to farmers and crofters whilst you complete your report. You can therefore get started with the tool yourself – and take control of this part of the process.
The benefits of a carbon footprint
If you have read this far, it is likely that you already want to get to grips with a carbon footprint on your farm. However, we understand it can be frustrating to spend more time at the computer. Here are the benefits we have hear from farmers using our tool over the past 15 years –
You will start to benefit as soon as you begin working with our tool. The calculator is used for all sorts of reasons:
Boost your interest in carbon – people want to understand greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and how they might be reduced. Combining 10 hectares once for example produces emissions of: 0.52 tCO2e, and this kind of information is readily available to you whilst you work on your report
Gain a unique view of your farm – often a fresh look at any business is a valuable exercise but you can also potentially make even more informed decisions
Create a baseline now for the future – it is likely that the earlier you footprint, the better prepared you will be for any future changes to guidance or otherwise
Be part of a positive narrative – more and more people are getting involved, and you can too. We think agriculture is ahead of the curve here.
Improve your business resilience – you may pinpoint cost-saving opportunities through resource efficiency
Someone asked you to – for example Meeting Carbon Audit standards as we have set out above. The Calculator is designed to be a problem solver!
Funding and support available
You will receive great advice from the Farm Advisory Service on their website, via email [email protected] or telephone 0300 323 0161 to support your journey.
But you may also want assistance with the carbon audit particularly if your farm is complex, you don’t have time, or you just want someone to take care of it for you.
There are a number of farm advisors we also support in Scotland who can help guide you through your footprint, or offer you recommendations based on your carbon audit. Check with us, or ask that your advisor uses The Farm Carbon Calculator and check their fees and the total cost to you. Email [email protected] to check.
If they are not sure about what tool might work best, put them in touch with us so we can offer them support. We have a range of plans available for farm consultants to use our software and give you great footprints at a low cost.
In order to receive funding for support it is usually a requirement that the advisors you contract should be Farm Business Advisory Service Scotland (FBAASS) accredited – so why not search the list available on the LANTRA website to find one near you: see list.
Receive funding for your Carbon Audit – Preparing for Sustainable Farming
We are pleased to see that funding is again available to help you under the Preparing for Sustainable Farming (PSF) programme as of February 2025. Previously it was understood that funding would be closed at this point to new applicants.
Funding in this programme is expected to close in February 2026 and you will be able to claim for footprints completed in the 2025 calendar year. If you can claim, don’t delay in doing so. Read more
Check carefully the eligibility criteria for this funding which we have simplified slightly here:
£500 is available to fund eligible Carbon Audits
A new carbon audit can be funded every 3 years – which sits within the 5 years required for the whole farm plan
If you have a carbon audit but it is not of the required standard, or your farm has changed materially you should be able to make a new claim
Carbon audits can be claimed for that were completed in the 2025 calendar year. With claims being made by February 2026
When you use the Farm Carbon Calculator – either yourself, or you have a consultant prepare your audit – this should be reviewed by an FBAASS advisor and they should give you recommendations to accompany your report that will help you reduce emissions.
If other funding becomes available you should not double claim.
Get started – checklist
Your Carbon Audit doesn’t have to be overwhelming use this checklist to help guide your decisions prior to getting started.
Get familiar with the Whole Farm Plan > read guidance
Check which audits are required, and by what dates > check up to date guidance. Carbon Audits are for all farms, but there may be others you would like to tackle first.
Check if you already have a valid Carbon Audit > if yes, you can stop here.
See if you can receive funding > check eligibility
Decide if you want to complete the Carbon Audit yourself, or pay for help > why not create an account and login to check. You may be able to receive funded and paid for assistance either way.
Complete the Carbon Audit
Complete your own Carbon Audit > the rest of this guide will help
you can still send this to an advisor for recommendations
Find an advisor who can help > Contact us or use LANTRA’s list.
check they use The Farm Carbon Calculator
check the cost to you.
Keep a copy of your Carbon Audit on file, or in our system. Should SGRPID inspect your audits you may need this to hand.
Ask, what next? Completing your Carbon Audit frees you up to look at other audits, but also may allow you to undertake funded soil analysis.
Soil Analysis is a requirement on Region 1 farmland, and should include carbon. These results can be inputted into your report to make your footprint even more accurate. Read the WFP guidance on Soil Analysis, the PSF guidance around funding, and our very own Monitoring Soil Carbon guide too.
General suggestions
Most guidance suggests you should use the same carbon footprinting tool over time for consistent tracking. We’d agree – though don’t forget you can replicate, or complete a previous year in any calculator. Talk to us if you need help with this
Whichever tool you use, keep a good record of changes made based on your report
At the very least, keep a copy of your report for your records, as it is your hard work, and your data. Your Farm Carbon Calculator dashboard is a great place to keep your reports secure over time
Once you have a carbon audit look for or ask an advisor for actionable recommendations. You might like to start on our Farm Carbon Toolkit – a great place for guidance and case studies!
Any questions? We’re here to help, contact Michael Brown, Customer Service Officer
At the Farm Carbon Toolkit, we’re excited to share news about our recent collaboration with Land App to support the development and launch of their new Soil Survey feature on Land App Mobile.
As part of the Agri-Carbon Kernow project in Cornwall, our team played a role in helping develop and test this tool, which is designed to help farmers and land managers record, report, and review both lab and in-field soil measurements.
A Collaborative Effort
Working closely with the Land App team, we brought together our expertise in soil health and carbon to create a digital soil sampling solution that meets real-world needs.
By integrating the robust soil survey methodologies we advocate in our projects into Land App’s platform, we’ve enabled farmers to gain deeper insights into soil health and carbon sequestration potential. The new feature not only helps users assess soil conditions with greater accuracy but also supports more informed decision-making for sustainable land management, as well as the evidence required for the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI).
The new Soil Survey feature enhances Land App Mobile’s suite of data collection tools—joining the General Data Collection survey and PTES’ Healthy Hedgerows—to provide reliable insights into soil health, which are essential for informed land management and funding applications.
Why It Matters
Digital Efficiency: Easily record and review soil sample data on the go, including the ability to support evidence required for SFI.
Sustainable Impact: Empowering better land management decisions through accurate, real-time data.
Collaborative Innovation: A tangible outcome of our work in the Agri-Carbon Kernow project, highlighting the benefits of cross-sector collaboration.
We’re proud to have supported Land App in bringing this feature to life and look forward to further innovations and collaborations. This includes using the Land App API to help users seamlessly manage their soil data within each platform.
Thank you to the team at Land App for their partnership—and for the opportunity to help shape tools that support sustainable land management!
Find out more
For further details and to see the Soil Survey feature in action, please refer to the Land App’s guidance.
Every five years, the Committee on Climate Change (CCC)1 publishes a statutory report detailing the UK’s ‘carbon budget’ for a future five-year period. The 7th Carbon Budget covers the period 2038-2042. It is a stock-take of UK GHG emissions (current and future) and provides advice to the Government on how and where these emissions will need to be reduced (‘the pathway’) if the UK is to meet its legal obligations to reduce emissions to net zero by 2050.
Within the 7th Carbon Budget report, it is good to see that the role of land use change in removing carbon is now being linked to agricultural land which gives a truer picture than was previously the case, when land use change was in a separate silo.
It is clear that the carbon budget is very high level, focussing on climate impacts only, with little reference to the impacts of the proposed changes on biodiversity across the UK’s agricultural land. In reviewing this budget, FCT has taken a very practical viewpoint and has reflected on areas where the budget could have helpfully provided more detail and looked at how to fully engage with farmers and growers across the land who are on the delivery frontline.
As other sectors decarbonise, the proportion of total emissions arising from agriculture will increase, putting more pressure on the sector to make progress on emissions reduction and carbon removals. In 2022 the contribution of agriculture to overall UK emissions was 12%. By 2040 this is predicted to rise to 27%, after the activity to reduce emissions set out in the carbon budget and it will be the second highest emitter after aviation even with the target action outlined in this carbon budget.
The report proposes a pathway for agriculture to reach net zero by 2050. Not surprisingly woodland creation, peatland restoration and other land use changes are highlighted as mechanisms to sequester more carbon. There is significant reliance on carbon sequestration into land sinks through the 2040’s but little reliance on any level of carbon sequestration into soil itself.
There is a reliance on increased tree planting from the late 2020’s onwards as trees will only start to sequester larger volumes of carbon from 15 years of age onwards. According to the UK Woodland Carbon Code, sequestration rates for woodland increase dramatically during the “teenage years” of woodland establishment. In total, woodland creation has been modelled to contribute 15% to emissions reduction by 2050 . This will require an additional 1.1 million ha of woodland to be planted by 2050. In addition some 300,000 ha of lowland peat and 970,000 ha of upland peat will be returned to natural/ rewetted condition by the same time.
For agriculture the reduction in overall GHG emissions is targeted at 45% by 2050 compared to 2022, coming primarily from a reduction in livestock numbers (38% by 2050) with a relatively small contribution from the adoption of low carbon farming practices. These reductions are significant, reducing the breeding flock of sheep from 15 to 11 million ewes and the breeding cattle herd from 3 to 2 million head.
The reduction in grazing livestock numbers will release land for tree planting. The combined effect of the changes to farming practice and tree planting is to suggest that the sector will become a net sequesterer of carbon by 2048.
There are a number of important assumptions included within this budget which bear further scrutiny:
Crop yields will increase by 16% by 2050. Presumably this increase is deemed necessary to ensure adequate plant based foods to replace the current levels of meat in our diets. However it is questionable whether this will be achievable in practice, even if gene editing technologies are successful and fully deployed as more adverse weather events are already affecting yield levels in the UK and across the world. It is not clear how critical to successful achievement of the overall plan this is.
Stocking rates for grazing livestock on lowland will increase by around 10% with stocking rates in the upland reduced. Presumably the former is to allow for more land to be released to grow crops for human consumption and the latter to reflect the current over-grazing in parts of the upland and to reflect rewetting of upland peatlands and the proposals for tree planting. Targeting increased stocking rates for lowland livestock could require additional artificial fertiliser inputs which would seem counter intuitive, though the increased stocking rate could potentially be achieved through improvements in grassland utilisation efficiency.
Consumption of meat products (primarily beef and lamb) will fall by 35% by 2050 compared to 2019 levels. On first sight it would appear that changes in consumption are mirroring proposed reductions in livestock numbers, however, no mention is made of any changes in dairy cow numbers, but since the majority of beef produced in the UK comes from the dairy herd this will also impact milk production. Consideration is also given to replacing meat in ready meals with plant based alternatives which will negatively affect carcass balance, with lower value “cuts” often used for this purpose at the moment. This would put further pressure on sector profitability. The targeted reduction in ruminant livestock numbers would lead to a lower requirement of permanent grassland for grazing of a similar order to the reduction in livestock numbers. This would amount to around 3 million ha which could be diverted for other use, where this is possible. Tree planting would be a key use for poorer quality ground (topography and stoniness) with better quality grassland moving to arable cropping where this is possible. This would probably lead to loss of carbon from soils, especially when permanent grassland is first transitioned to arable cropping2. It is not clear whether this has been accounted for within the overall budget.
The carbon budget includes a very low value (0.5Mt CO2e per year for carbon removed by grassland soils). This appears to be low and seems to take little account of the ability for well-managed livestock systems to bring multiple benefits beyond reducing emissions including carbon removals into soils and enhanced biodiversity.
More research and data analysis is required urgently to inform us of the ability of the soil to permanently and reliably store more carbon and how best this can be done. We have some information as do others, but as yet this is not a body of evidence which the CCC can use as part of its carbon budget.
Returning around 300,000 ha lowland peat to a rewetted state will impinge upon its current use for growing vegetables, fruit and arable crops. The report does mention that some 10% of horticultural production will move indoors, which is likely to focus on leafy salad type crops. However for field scale vegetable production left to be grown outdoors the question remains as to where they will be grown. Moving vegetable growing to other parts of the UK will require careful site selection if current levels of margin (currently pretty low) are to be maintained and consideration of the infrastructure required, such as pack houses and cold stores.
There were also a number of notable omissions from the budget:
Whilst the pathway to reduce nitrous oxide emissions are recognised as coming primarily from agriculture, there is no mention of the need to reduce reliance on fossil fuel based N fertilisers. For arable cropping, up to 75% of total emissions arise from the production and use of artificial N fertiliser. Great work is being done to produce low carbon alternatives, but further information on the likely “winning technologies” in this space would have been helpful.
The level of efficiency of the UK to produce food at a lower GHG intensity than some other nations, utilising fewer arable resources (land and feed) and with lower supply chain discards through a circular feed system provides the nation with a competitive advantage in terms of overall emissions per unit of home grown food. This could be better recognised within the budget report.
There is no mention of any target to reduce numbers of pigs and poultry within this 7th Carbon Budget. Whilst the animals themselves do not emit methane, their manures do and their reliance on imported soya has a significant impact on overall UK agriculture emissions as well as the soil degradation associated with cereal production to grow the cereals they wholly rely on. We have estimated that reducing reliance on imported soya by 50% and moving to feeding UK grown beans and pulses will reduce the emissions from agriculture by 7% (primarily due to reduced reliance on artificial N fertiliser and to removing deforestation emissions on 50% soya supply).
Reliance on land use change to enable agriculture to reach net zero by 2050
In the period from 2043-2050 agriculture and land use are budgeted to contribute the largest share of net emissions reduction (35%) – see figure 2 below from the Carbon Budget report, and to reach net zero emissions by 2050 as a result of increases in carbon sequestration into land sinks (primarily increased areas of woodland and reduced emissions from peatland due to changed management) with emissions of around 25Mt CO2e and sequestration of around 26Mt CO2e per year. Current emissions from UK agriculture are around 48Mt CO2e per year.
At FCT, we are in agreement with the Agriculture Advisory Group of the UK Climate Change Committee and its report in calling for more nuanced targets which better reflect the benefits of UK livestock production, especially when it is primarily based on the consumption of forages. We also agree with their view that it is important to reflect on the impact of the different gases on warming aligned to the Paris Agreement temperature goal. Both GWP100 and GWP* metrics are important and could already be reported in concert to inform on both GHG accounting (CO2e) for national inventories and impact of different GHGs on climate warming (CO2e) important for the Paris Agreement.
We believe that the report could be much more positive about the contribution that resilient farming businesses, agricultural land and farmers can make to meeting the climate change challenge. Positive engagement and empowerment of farmers, growers and land managers are critical elements in building confidence and encouraging investment but is currently patchy, with beacons of good practice such as the Farm Net Zero project in Cornwall, which is delivering change on the ground and practically supporting farm businesses to transition towards net zero.
Footnotes
A body set up to hold the government to account on their progress towards net zero and reducing emissions
The UK GHG inventory suggests that the average change in non- organic soil carbon density (to 1M deep) from converting grassland to cropland in England is -24 tonnes C/ ha, in Scotland is -101 tC/ha, Wales -39 tC/ha and NI -68 tC/ha
The key areas of grassland management that are known to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions are fertiliser application and management of applications, grazing management, introduction of more diverse species into grassland including legumes and herbs, and correct use and application of farmyard manures and slurries
Effective, efficient use of artificial N fertilisers
Greenhouse gas emissions from synthetic fertilisers is a significant emissions source on grassland farms. 50% of emissions come from the production of the synthetic fertilisers and about 50% from the processes that take place in the soil after application. Estimates suggest that 10-30% of all applied nitrogen fertiliser is lost to the crop or grassland to which it is applied; use efficiency is influenced by application method and environmental conditions at the time of spreading. Make sure soil pH is above 6.5 if possible, soils are not compacted, that soil temperature is warm and rising and that soils are not not waterlogged. Do the basics well and you will get better yield response from your fertilisers and lower GHG emissions.
Reliance on Inorganic N fertiliser usage can be reduced through incorporating more legumes into swards. Establishing clover within temporary leys has additional benefits of higher protein forage and also a more diverse rooting system which can aid production in adverse climatic conditions. Typically grass clover swards containing around 30% clover by DM can fix around 120Kg – 180 Kg N /ha/ year. When they are in the sward, this is free nitrogen fertiliser!
As we are coming to appreciate that the nitrous oxide emissions associated with inorganic N fertilisers are a huge part of agriculture’s total emissions, improving N fertiliser use efficiency is critical. Saving 170kg N/ ha across 50ha will reduce emissions by around 58 tonnes CO2e which is more carbon than is sequestered annually in 10ha of broadleaf woodland.
Grazing Management
Grazing rotation is an excellent way to increase grass utilisation and reduce GHG emissions. Ensure there are adequate rest periods between grazing cycles to allow the sward to recover to optimise soil and plant health. Consider sub-dividing fields further to allow for more regular livestock movement. The long term effect of increasing rest periods and grazing taller grass is improved soil organic matter and soil structure. This will aid in reducing weed burden, lengthen the grazing season and improve resilience to flood and drought.
Including deeper rooting and more traditional species will increase above and below-ground biodiversity which may increase productivity alongside potential carbon capture and sequestration deeper into the soil profile. Ensure that grassland species composition supports production goals, soil type, soil pH and climatic conditions and consider overseeding where required.
Overseeding permanent pasture with improved diversity can provide a wide array of benefits. If 5 ha permanent pasture was over-seeded or re-seeded to create a herbal ley (consistent with SAM3 SFI) it could provide an additional -15.68 t CO2e of carbon removed per year. This will also build soil health and resilience by optimising the above ground canopy increasing the surface area of leaves for photosynthesis and supporting a greater below ground biodiversity responsible for cycling nutrients.
Accurate consideration of manures and slurries
Sampling and analysis of your farmyard manures and slurries will enable optimal accounting for the nutrients in them. Knowing what you are applying will enhance the accuracy of nutrient management planning and could reduce the requirement for synthetic N fertiliser. Consider the application method when applying organic manures to avoid nutrient losses and if possible cover muck heaps like silage heaps where possible to avoid dilution and runoff of nutrients.
I’m Calum, the Calculator Data Assistant for the Farm Carbon Toolkit (FCT). I can imagine if you don’t work for FCT, you may not know who I am. I tend to work in the background, assisting the passionate and driven people who do great work in helping farmers to meet their low carbon and sustainability goals.
Day to day, my activities and tasks can vary widely, depending on the needs of the Calculator team as well as Izzy, our Data Scientist with whom I also work closely.
I primarily work with the Calculator team which can involve a variety of tasks. One of my main responsibilities is the rigorous testing of the Calculator after every update, and following the addition of new items to the calculator. Flagging errors and helping to resolve issues (if indeed there are any!) ensures a reliable tool and the efficient running of the calculator that farmers and landowners can use seamlessly. Another major part of my role is information-finding. Regularly, the Calculator team receives requests for additional products/items/data entries to be added to the calculator. Personally, I was surprised by how many crop protection products (insecticides/herbicides etc.) that are available to farmers, upwards of 30,000 different products available in the UK alone. So you can imagine, with changing trends and needs of farmers to protect their crops in various ways, we as a Calculator team need to keep up with adding additional products to the calculator.
Outwith helping the smooth running of the calculator, my responsibilities include assisting Izzy, our Data Scientist, with her work. Recently, I’ve been assisting her in updating and maintaining soil sampling datasets using QGIS (a spatial data software) that have been collected by the advisory team. I also assist Izzy by testing apps that she designed herself! One of which is a soil sampling app for use by the FCT Advisory team to record soil sampling points more efficiently. I’m particularly grateful for this piece of work as it takes me away from my desk and gets me walking around, albeit on the streets of Edinburgh rather than the fields.
My day to day can vary depending on the tasks that are required or whether I’m working out of my flat, a cafe or the Melting Pot, the co-working space I go to. I’m kept on my toes with the diversity of work to do. Through this type of work, it might seem easy to disassociate from the real-world challenges faced by farmers in a changing climate when you’re spending your days hidden behind a screen, focused on numbers and code. However, this is what I feel FCT does very well, in connecting us to the issues we are all helping to solve. Between the numbers and spreadsheets, we do well to have numerous meetings, whether it be online, hearing about the projects FCT are involved in such as Farm Net Zero, or in person days where we celebrate the farmers that are doing the most to demonstrate low-carbon, sustainable agriculture.
My first in-person day was last September at our annual field day, where FCT presented the Carbon Farmer of the Year. An opportunity to hear first-hand what farmers are implementing to produce our food in a sustainable and low-carbon manner with the help of our carbon calculator. I always come back from these days feeling invigorated to tackle the next challenge knowing that farmers are using the calculator to benefit their farms and the environment.
Written by Tim Dart / Project Manager, Farm Carbon Toolkit
This article reviews the mechanisms and inputs to ruminant diets which are known to impact greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. It explores how these can be used by ruminant livestock farmers, alongside their limitations and the need for more research into more systems-based approaches to reduce methane emissions from ruminants.
Methane (CH4) is an important greenhouse gas in livestock-based agriculture as it is particularly potent. Over a 20-year period, methane is approximately 80 times more powerful at heating the earth than carbon dioxide (CO2), though it dissipates much more quickly (7-12 years) compared to CO2. Because methane is such a potent greenhouse gas, anything that can be done to reduce those emissions cost-effectively and without negative impacts on animal health, welfare and productivity is beneficial.
Ruminant animals have diverse microbial populations in their stomachs and these form a natural ecosystem in their own right. Anaerobic fermentation is a key process in the digestion of natural forage-based diets. Methane is released by anaerobic microbial activity through a process called methanogenesis and is consequentially released into the atmosphere as a by-product of digestion. Methane production also results in a loss of gross ingested energy and reduces animal growth and development, so minimising methane production can in theory lead to an increase in animal growth and productivity.
All ruminants (cattle, but also sheep and goats) together, contribute 30% of global methane released into the earth’s atmosphere. While this briefing focuses on methane inhibitors in ruminant diets, there are also opportunities to reduce methane emissions post-digestion, such as through manure and slurry management, biodigesters and activity to increase dung beetle activity. This will be the focus of a forthcoming briefing. Strategies to reduce enteric methane production are a major focus of research, due to the significance of methane. Initiatives like the Global Methane Hub are leading work on increasing our understanding of the mechanisms for reducing methane production safely in ruminants. Feasible approaches include improved animal and feed management, such as diet formulation, which has shown potential for meaningful emissions reductions. This is an active area of interest for organisations such as the Farm Carbon Toolkit (FCT) alongside our work on strategies to reduce enteric methane production post leaving the digestive system.
The commercial backdrop
FCT is aware of the significant ongoing efforts to develop products aimed at reducing methane emissions. Much of this work has focused on supplements that can be added to the animal’s diets, as these offer clear commercial opportunities for manufacturers. However, generating robust scientific data to support solutions based on practice changes, rather than commercially sold products, has been more challenging. As a result, these approaches and beneficial practices are underrepresented in discussions about methane reduction, due to the current lack of robust evidence demonstrating their effectiveness.
Adding supplements to ruminant diets becomes difficult to achieve when those animals are consuming a forage-based diet, grazing in the wider environment and consuming a variable and diverse range of plant species. In these situations, research into the makeup of these forages which can reduce emissions is taking place, but with no patentable product to promote, the investment in research and development is understandably less intense. As such, FCT as a farmer-led community interest company, may have a legitimate role in seeking to facilitate and advance the science in this area of research and development.
Feed supplements are now becoming commercially available in the UK. The most common supplement currently is 3-NOP (Bovaer®) which has drawn the attention of the media in recent weeks. There are thought to be other products in advanced development that are now close to market. There are other strategies and approaches where scientific data has established methane inhibitory activity which we discuss below.
Current understanding of Methane Inhibitors and their mode of action
Bovaer®
Bovaer is a synthetically manufactured enzyme inhibitor with an active ingredient called 3-Nitrooxypropanol (hence 3-NOP Bovaer). It is scientifically referred to as a Methyl co-enzyme or M reductase Inhibitor, meaning it blocks the activity of a combination of enzymes that breaks down organic compounds (under anaerobic conditions found in the rumen) and therefore prevents the final biochemical stage of methane release. It is called a reductase process (a reduction process) that would normally result in the breakdown of a glucose chain (a sugar) into CH4 (a methane compound). 3-NOP inhibits that activity.
Bovaer has undergone rigorous safety checks by the Food Standards Agency as part of its market authorisation process and is approved for use, and is considered safe for the consumers of milk and beef. It has been demonstrated to be safe for the animal, consumers, workers and the environment.
The dosage of Bovaer is recommended at 1 gram per 20 kg of feed (label recommendation). The manufacturer claims that a 45% reduction in methane emissions for dairy cows and 30% for beef cattle, is achievable, but only when the supplement is fed within a blended or total mixed ration.
Seaweed
Microalgae, commonly known as seaweed, are a large group of marine plants, made up of three relevant taxa: Rhodophyta (red), Chlorophyta (green) and Phaeophyceae (brown). Bromoform is found in the highest concentrations in red seaweed Aspargopsis, which is grown in subtropical regions around the world.Brormoform is also found in lower concentrations in the brown and green seaweed groups which are more ubiquitous and widespread in the world’s oceans. Feed additives derived from Asparagopsis have reduced methane emissions by 40+% and 90% respectively.
Bromoform (CHBR3) has proven to be highly effective at inhibiting methanogenesis along with other halogenated volatile organic compounds. These VOCs effectively bind to enzymes and reductases, reducing H2 and CO2 release and through archaeal organisms these produce CH4.
There are some studies and claims that Bromoform promotes increases in animal productivity, but other studies report modest reductions in milk yields (-6.5%) this appears to occur when reductions in animal intakes of feed are also observed. There has also been some evidence of abnormalities of the rumen walls of participating animals in such studies, with the loss of papillae and microscopic inflammation found in two studies, although the studies were not able to directly conclude that damage to the rumen was as a result of A.taxiformis supplementation. It is clear that there are discrepancies within the results of the various studies undertaken using Bromoform and that the energy in the H2 compounds resulting from the reductase reaction is not 100% possible to be re-diverted into volatile fatty acids and appears to require the expansion of H2 sinks within the rumen and is seen as an area of further developmental work.
There are numerous other bioactive compounds within the microalgae plants / seaweeds, and are known to produce other compounds that have anti-microbial function that could modify the rumen environment and reduce methane emissions in different ways. These include; phlorotannis, saponins, sulfonated glycans and other halocarbons and bacteriocins, these are the source of ongoing research and developmental work.
Condensed Tannins
Condensed Tannins (CT’s) are commonly found in high concentrations in various UK native flora, including Greater Birdsfoot Trefoil, Birdsfoot Trefoil and Sainfoin. These are all commonly found in herbal leys. CT’s are complex plant polymers of polyphenols found in legumes and other C3-type plants. CT’s are considered to reduce methane emissions through the following mechanisms:
Reducing fibre fermentation
Inhibiting the growth of methanogenic micro-organisms
Acting directly against hydrogen-producing microbes.
CT’s are able to bind to proteins, polysaccharides and metal ions and inhibit fibre digestion of longer-chain starch, cellulose and hemi-cellulose. As such CT’s consequently reduce the formation of hydrogen and acetate and inhibits the growth of methanogenic microorganisms, thus reducing enteric CH4.
Excessive inclusion of biologically active Condensed Tannins within ruminant diets have been found to be detrimental if it exceeds 6% of the overall animal diet in terms of dry matter intake (DMI). Elevated levels have been found to impact negatively on animal performance in terms of growth rate or milk yield. Target inclusion of CT’s are recommended to between 2 and 4% where improvements in animal performance can be achieved. The scientific quantification of the impact of CT’s on Methane emissions is not clear, with the research inconsistent with the work that has been published to date, but it is not considered inconsequential.
From other parts of the world, studies (predominantly Australia) are being undertaken on management practices and cattle browsing legumes known to hold high levels of Tannins, Desmanthus or Leucaena species. Leuceana is a tropical and sub-tropical legume fodder crop and Desmanthus is a tropical legume. The inclusion of both crops in ruminant diets has been shown to improve live weight gains and reduce methane emissions in cattle.
Diversity and grazing diets
By embracing the diversity of grazing diets, there is potential to reduce ruminant emissions through a whole-systems approach. This involves increasing the overall dietary content of tannins coming from multiple grazed forage species, such as herbal leys, willow and other silvopastoral feeds. This can achieve a measurable and meaningful reduction in enteric methane production. However, achieving this requires investment and expansion of knowledge and empirical quantification.
Other options
Other options for exploring enteric methane production, including but not exhaustively:
Genetic selection
Vaccination
Feeding of grape marc (which is high in Tannins)
Adding nitrate or biochar to feed
Conclusion
This is a dynamic area of development and knowledge exploration on GHG emissions, with many complex interconnections to broader environmental concerns. It is important to recognise these links, which include, but are not limited to, animal welfare, animal longevity, as well as other sustainability factors such as biodiversity, water quality, air quality. These, along with other far-reaching sustainability goals, must be carefully balanced to inform the best possible decisions.
Written by Alex Bebbington, Project Officer, Rural Business School, Duchy College
In November 2024, a farm walk was hosted by Andrew and Claire Brewer, winners of the Carbon Farmers of the Year 2024, as well as being a Farm Net Zero Demo Farm.
The Farm Net Zero (FNZ) project was very proud of Demo Farmers Andrew and Claire Brewer of Ennis Barton for winning the 2024 Carbon Farmer of the Year competition. Carbon Farmer of the Year is run by the Farm Carbon Toolkit and is sponsored by HSBC Agriculture UK. It aims to support farmers on their transition to low-carbon farming by championing farmers who are successfully on that transition and creating a network to learn from.
On Friday 8th November 2024, Andrew Brewer hosted a farm walk to explain some of the practices that led to him winning this year’s Carbon Farmer of the Year competition.
Andrew and Claire farm 1,000 acres at Fraddon, near Newquay, milking 450 autumn-calving Jersey cross cows to supply Arla. Cows calve in late summer and are milked twice a day, sometimes in a 10 milkings in 7 days system. Land is let for field vegetables and potatoes as part of the rotation. Andrew is a Demo Farm for the Farm Net Zero project and carbon footprinting from this has shown that the farm is emitting 0.67kg CO₂e per kg of Fat and Protein Corrected Milk (FPCM). Andrew puts this down to maximising milk from forage, feeding little concentrate, and farming without any fertiliser on grass for the last four years. As well as working to reduce emissions, Andrew is optimising sequestration in hedges and soils.
Grazing management and herbal leys
The dairy herd grazes for as much of the year as possible, where conditions allow. Sometimes this may only be for a few hours a day, but Andrew feels this is an important part of his farming practices. Grass is the cheapest feed available and if the cows can harvest it themselves (aiming for 90% of the cow’s feed intake from grazed grass) then this not only reduces costs, but also reduces emissions from tractor diesel. Similarly, letting the cows out to pasture means that they can “spread their own slurry”, further reducing costs and emissions (both from diesel use and from slurry storage).
Herbal leys are used extensively across the grazing platform. Their deep, diverse roots help to improve soil health, potentially capturing carbon into the soil, and access minerals and nutrients deep in the soil profile, allowing for good growth without artificial fertiliser. The impact of the herbal ley on milk yield and quality is being assessed through a Farm Net Zero Field Lab, comparing cow performance on herbal leys and ryegrass/white clover swards. The results of this study will be available soon.
Calving
Cows calve outside in late summer, with the calves then reared in batches in a woodchip bedded shed. The woodchip creates a very clean environment, eliminating the need for bought-in straw. All calves are taken through to finish, with beef bulls kept entire and finished at 12 months and beef heifers finished at 17 months. Youngstock are grazed on a mix of pasture, cover crops and the leftover vegetable crops after the human-grade plants are harvested. This integration of farm enterprises helps to fully utilise nutrients across the farm, reducing the need for buying inputs in.
Soil health: the basis of the farm business
Andrew did a Nuffield Scholarship in 2015 and attributes this to changing his views on soil health as the basis of the farm business. Through the Farm Net Zero project, soil carbon has been monitored over a number of years and the carbon sequestered into these fields has halved the farm’s carbon footprint. Andrew acknowledged that the carbon sequestration is variable, with not all fields capturing carbon, but will continue to monitor soil carbon in the future to identify the long-term trends.
Farm trails
As part of the FNZ Demo Farm work, Dr Hannah Jones of Farm Carbon Toolkit has assisted in the development of a variety of soil-focused trials. When fields are let for vegetables and potatoes, the soil can require assistance back to optimum status. Trials to reduce the negative impacts of these practices have included intercropping between cabbages to reduce bare soil and the risk of runoff. Another trial has followed methods to restore soil health after potatoes. Different mixes were planted after potatoes to assess the improvements to soil structure, stability and worm content. Results from this suggested that Westerwolds ryegrass had the greatest positive impact on soil health, possibly because of its rapid growth creating a large root mass, so Andrew now grows Westerwolds following veg crops. This fits well with the dairy as the Westerwolds produces excellent feed for strip-grazing dry cows before calving, another example of how the whole farm system is integrated to minimise the need for emissions-intensive inputs.
In all, Andrew and Claire focus on running a simple system well, integrating enterprises across the farm. This allows them to minimise emissions from inputs, as well as maximising sequestration into soils and hedgerows.
Guest blog by Claire Wallerstein, Cornwall Climate Care
Food systems under threat from climate change
Among the many threats posed by climate change, maybe the greatest is to our food systems. With our country producing less than 60% of what we eat, and the climate crisis already having a huge impact on many of the places we import our food from, the UK clearly needs to become more self-sufficient.
But increasingly extreme weather is affecting food production right here too. Following last winter’s endless rains, British farmers have had one of their worst harvests ever. We know that the way our land is farmed and managed can help us to mitigate the impacts of the climate crisis… or indeed to make things much worse.
However, with farmers facing unprecedented financial challenges and record numbers now fearing they’ll go out of business, can we realistically expect them to protect us all from climate change too?
Farming and land use are also increasingly becoming a lightning rod in the climate culture wars. Half-truths, misinformation and outright lies are being pushed across social media by those with a vested interest in crushing the whole green agenda.
While filming the Cornwall’s Climate Stories documentaries, we’ve been keen to find out whether all of this is impacting real world efforts to boost pro-climate and nature-friendly farming.
Farmers centre stage, with a supporting role by FCT!
As filmmakers without a personal connection to farming, it’s been fascinating for us to interview so many farmers and food producers across Cornwall (and our film Food for Thought was actually presented by an organic beef farmer).
We’ve also featured several members of the Farm Carbon Toolkit (FCT) team, including technical director Becky Willson, who we met in the middle of the 2022 drought.
Becky demonstrating the properties and health of soil
Becky took us out in a Cornish field to show us the huge differences that regenerative farming can make to both farmers and wider society. Biologically-healthy soils are not only more fertile, but also store more carbon, support more wildlife, and hold much more water – reducing flash flooding during our increasingly torrential downpours, but also enabling crops to keep growing during increasing periods of drought.
Another of our interviewees was FCT Impact Manager Jonathan Smith, who is trying to adapt to increasing coastal erosion as the sea level rises around his beautiful organic farm on St Martin’s in the Isles of Scilly.
Meanwhile, Farm Carbon & Soil Advisor Anthony Ellis appeared in our film Power to the People about climate change and energy, addressing one of the biggest flashpoints around climate action in rural areas – solar farms.
The loud public outcry against the idea of solar panels covering productive farmland has been unavoidable. However, Anthony believes we’re missing a trick by viewing land use in such a binary way.
He has raised his panels up 18 inches higher than usual to allow his sheep to graze beneath them. Aside from bringing him in additional income, the panels also improve the welfare of his animals.
When we visited on a very hot summer’s day, the sheep were relaxing in the shade of the panels and Anthony explained the grass holds on better beneath them during droughts than it does out in the open. Chickens can be kept beneath solar panels and all manner of veg grown between them too.
Anthony’s sheep under solar panels on a warm day
Few will argue that solar farms are beautiful – but the popular view of these sites as sterile and lifeless can be far from the truth. Recent studies have found well-managed solar farms act as vital havens for wildflowers and critical pollinators among barren landscapes of industrial farmland.
Bringing nuance into the debate
Concern over food security is totally understandable. However, even if all the solar area envisioned in the government’s net zero plans were built, this would still take up only 0.3% of our land area – just half the amount of land taken up by golf courses (and 0.5% of the land currently used for farming).
Solar farms are far from the only controversial way of using farmland to tackle the climate crisis though. Tree-planting initiatives are also leading to fears of food-growing areas being lost.
However, the picture is more nuanced here too. Agroforestry is a great way of introducing more trees into the landscape, while still using it for farming.
Chris Jones, who farms near Ladock, has planted strips of willow through some fields, allowing him to mob graze his livestock (regularly moving animals on from one small area of land to another, which is a great way of boosting soil biology and carbon storage).
Mob grazed cattle
Planting more trees across a farm, or allowing hedgerows to grow out, not only benefits birds, pollinators and other wildlife. This can also provide shade and shelter, important for livestock as our weather becomes more extreme, as well as additional fodder. Trees can also be coppiced to provide firewood or fencing materials, or could provide additional crops such as fruit or nuts.
Tree planting is often linked to something else that has spawned huge controversy – rewilding. Yet several farmers across Cornwall are involved in this to different degrees too, re-introducing extinct or struggling species from tiny harvest mice or water voles to larger and much more misunderstood ones, like beavers.
There’s alarm in some quarters about beavers eating fish (they’re vegetarian) or killing trees (most of the trees they fell regenerate). Concern about flooding of farmland may be more of a possibility. However, experience in countries like Germany, where beavers were reintroduced over 60 years ago, has shown these animals can be managed and relocated quite easily if problems arise.
In terms of benefits, beavers’ leaky dams help to clean up rivers and drastically reduce flash flooding, while the ponds behind them have been proven to kickstart an amazing return of other life, from insects and fish to bats and birds. Importantly for farmers in our changing climate, they can also provide a valuable reserve of water for potential use in times of drought.
Turning challenges to opportunities
We’ve met so many Cornish farmers who are grasping the climate challenge with great enthusiasm – from the Stoke Climsland cluster of small farmers working together to create wildlife corridors across their wider landscape, to huge businesses like Riviera Produce, which farms 8,000 acres across Cornwall, producing a significant amount of the UK’s cauliflowers, cabbage, courgettes and kale.
Riviera farm manager David Thomas looking at soil quality in a field of green manure
By adopting more techniques such as companion planting to encourage natural pest predators, Riviera have managed to massively reduce the amounts of pesticides and other chemicals they use. Worm counts in their soils have boomed, and by using cover crops after harvest instead of leaving bare earth there’s now far less run-off from their fields to cause flooding in nearby villages.
But…. there is one big elephant in the room around farming and climate action in Cornwall. Just a cursory glance shows that most of our farmland is dedicated to livestock – and the climate impact globally of the meat and dairy industry is huge.
Livestock farming may be a traditional part of Cornwall’s heritage and it’s true that we grow grass here very well. However, many animals today actually live in highly intensive systems dependent on imported feed and chemicals, with their waste contained in vast slurry lagoons that pump out planet-heating methane.
Innovative Cornish research is attempting to tackle these impacts – for example by capturing methane and turning it into a green fuel, or researching new feeds to replace damaging Amazonian soya.
These advances are important given that these mass-produced animal products are sadly much more affordable than milk or meat from higher welfare and more nature-friendly, pasture-fed animals.
However, it’s also important to recognise that nearly 10% of the UK population is now either vegetarian or vegan. Could this offer new diversification opportunities for Cornish farmers too?
We already have more Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) schemes, growing veg to organic principles, than anywhere else in the country – but there is potential for much more horticulture here too. A changing climate may increasingly also enable us to farm more and different crops, such as sweet potatoes, soya and grapes.
Holly Whitelaw testing (and tasting?!) soil at Boasvern CSA in West Cornwall
At least one Cornish livestock farmer is even considering growing oats to tap into the vegan oat milk market too!
Farmers have always been great at adapting to whatever is thrown at them – be that weather, government policies or changing public tastes.
However, as climate impacts worsen, adaptability is going to become key to their survival. We all depend on farmers three times a day, so supporting them in this changing world should be a priority for all of us too.
We’ve seen some tantalising glimpses all over Cornwall of many ways in which farming could become more resilient and much better for nature, people and the climate.
Making this a meaningful reality is clearly going to need much greater support from the government. However, we hope that, by showcasing the stories of so many passionate food producers around Cornwall, our films can help to enthuse more of the farming community to get on board with becoming part of the climate solution too.
In this series, we look at the changes in management that farmers and growers are taking in response to a changing climate. We’re looking at the tips, techniques and approaches that are borne out of the lived experience of farmers and growers, in response to a changing climate driven by global heating.
FCT exists to help food and farming businesses to reduce their carbon footprint, but increasingly every farming business also is having to adapt to the climate that we now have. It’s therefore vital that food and farming does both climate mitigation and adaptation at the same time.
Over recent years they have noticed a change in weather patterns, which has affected their farm in significant ways. Adam comments:
“The increasing frequency and intensity of high rainfall events coming with our changing climate are causing challenges in crop planning, and significant impacts on our soil. Soil erosion and water infiltration can be made much worse by heavy rainfall, especially in short amounts of time, as we’ve been experiencing.”
Indeed, research by EJP Soils shows that changes in rainfall patterns across Europe will be responsible for up to 23% more soil erosion by 2050. This could have very significant impacts on soil health, water quality and could lead to significant losses of soil carbon – the one major asset that farmers have to sequester carbon on their farmland.
The UK Met Office predict that rainfall will get more intense in both summer and winter over coming years and decades, in particular with very local variations; in other words, hard to predict and plan for.
Protecting the soil
Whilst we can’t influence the weather, we can respond to the weather patterns as we see them emerging. A good example is how we manage our soils, as this is so fundamental to food and farming. It is well known that leaving soil uncovered (in arable and horticultural systems) can lead to soil erosion, a decrease in soil organic matter, a loss of soil biodiversity, and other negative impacts on soil health and structure.
In turn, bare soil can have significant short and long term impacts on crop health, quality and yields. Water courses can end up being clogged up with soil and full of the nutrients that should be in our fields. Carbon can be oxidised and lost to the atmosphere, so that soils emit rather than sequester carbon.
Working out ways to change farming systems to be more resilient to these changes in climate will be critical for all farmers and growers. There are range of ways to build a more resilient soil, as Adam discusses:
“Over the last few years, we have changed our soil management practices. We’re working towards improving and maintaining soil health through regenerative principles. We’ve reduced tillage significantly, ploughing just one year in four now, and using pig tail tines as primary cultivation, with a power harrow. We’re also rotating some land with livestock and we’re very keen on keeping living roots in the soil as much as possible.
An example of standing water in tractor wheelings and a bed of carrots just harvested, with bare soil visible
Importantly we’ve really increased plant diversity and soil coverage. We’re constantly undersowing crops, so 80-90% of all fields have a green manure of some sort. This reduces exposure of soil to the weather, builds fertility and increases biodiversity.
There are three rotations across the market garden. Fertility building leys make up about 20-25% of land in any given year. Here we’re using 10-15 different varieties, including clovers, and annuals or biannuals – no long term grasses, we prefer cereals like rye oats and barley, plus winter wheat. We’re aiming to put in more deeper rooted species such as plantain, buckthorn, chicory, yarrow.
Deep rooting species can help improve soil structure and water infiltration
We also add manures (from our landlord’s organic farm), the amount being crop dependent. But with Soil Organic Matter levels at over 7%, we don’t need to add too much manure, and increasingly the green manures are performing that fertility building role.”
The impacts
Seeing is believing, and farmers and growers tend to learn a lot from looking at each other’s farms and understanding what others do differently. Knowing when something is working can be self-evident to farmers, not necessarily needing research to back it up.
At Pitney Farm Market Garden, Adam describes the impact of the changes they’ve made:
“Water infiltration rates on the areas covered by green manures are so much better; it’s obvious just to look at. There is no standing water on the green manures, even after heavy rain, whereas in the wheelings and a few bare beds there is standing water. This is evidence enough to me that we’re doing something right.
Kale with red and crimson clover undersown
Living plants cover the soil, reducing the speed and intensity that rain hits the soil. Roots help water sink into the ground, massively increasing infiltration rates and stopping the water running off the surface and carrying soil with it.
Soil improvements through Adam and Rita’s management have led to much improved water infiltration through better soil structure and aggregation
The healthier a soil is, with better aggregation, the faster the infiltration rate will be, meaning the larger amount of rainfall that the soil can deal with. We’re seeing good aggregation now in the top four inches of soil and lots of earthworms. We’re hoping that by introducing more deeper rooting species that aggregation will improve further down the soil profile.”
Bigger picture
When it comes to managing these issues of flooding and drought on a wider scale, Adam shares some thoughts:
“I’m coming to think that undersowing crops and ensuring the soil is covered, is actually an essential practice, not a nice add on. This is because of the increasing frequency and intensity of high rainfall events coming with our changing climate.
A lot of our agricultural soils in this country are in poor health. Many soils – particularly those under maize, are in very poor condition and have very little capacity to hold water. As the climate deteriorates, more and more farmers have to work harder and harder to produce crops, and do even more to protect our most precious resource, the soil, from harsher conditions.
Green manures and crops side by side, ensuring almost full soil cover at Pitney Farm Market Garden
Is the support, both technically and financially, in place to help farmers across the board to do this? Sadly, I really don’t think it is. The government doesn’t have a handle on it, and is not taking it seriously, which is really worrying. The climate crisis terrifies me on all sorts of levels. The impacts on global food supply chains and food security could be massive. We need to manage our soils better to both mitigate and adapt to climate change, as well as recreating our food systems to build resilience in food and farming.”
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