THE heatwave now over, the wind has once again returned to a more northerly direction, making it feel rather chilly when the sun disappears behind the clouds which have been covering the sky for most of the week. Mid-week we had 9.5 mm rain over one night, which just wet the ground for a few hours.

In between routine cattle work Nathan has been busy clearing tall grasses and invasive shrubs from underneath some of the electric fences so that they work properly.

He has also been digging a large hole at the entrance to a long thin field of grass for a gate-post to be set in. Having dug the hole, Richard helped him to secure the post with some concrete and are leaving it to harden properly before hanging a new gate.

Nathan then cultivated a small part of our EFA (ecological focus area) in which we were going to plant a wild flower mix, but due to the dry conditions a suitable seed bed could not be produced in time to get good germination, so planting was abandoned for this year.

James, who works every Wednesday and weekends, cultivated our larger fallow area of EFA (total EFA is five per cent of the arable acreage) to try and get rid of some more weeds before the field is planted with a crop in the autumn.

During the week Rex, our agronomist, walked round our growing crops to check how they were progressing, before discussing the cropping for 2018. The crop rotation for next year focuses on controlling weeds and disease.

He found that our maize has grown well and is about two weeks ahead of its normal growth cycle. There is a saying in the industry that maize should be "knee high on the 4th of July" and ours is well above this.

Rex also found a few ears of winter wheat showing signs of Fusarium infection. An infected ear of grain will look white and bleached, with shrivelled grains. Fusarium ear blight is caused by a fungus which infects the plant during the flowering period.

This and related fungi can produce harmful mycotoxins (secondary metabolites capable of causing disease and death in humans and animals). Rainfall is a major factor in determining the risk of a fusarium infection, which is classed as moderate this year due to the arrival of warmer, wetter weather during the peak flowering period from mid-June. However, due to localisation of showers, there is variation in risk. Fusarium infection can reduce crop yields by three tonnes per hectare. There are strict legislative limits controlling mycotoxins in animal and human food.

A field of spring oilseed rape (sown after the planted winter oilseed rape failed) also has a problem, as it is under attack from pollen beetles. These beetles are attracted to the odour of the flowers, where the adults feed. The females also lay their eggs in the unopened flower buds, where they hatch into larvae which feed on the pollen. This pest can produce a large reduction in yield at harvest.

On the dairy side of the farm we have begun to dry off some of the milking cows. This is a time when the daily milk yield of the cows, due to calve in about two months' time, has fallen to a low level. These cows have their concentrate ration fed in the milking parlour stopped to help reduce their milk yield to a very low level.

After about a week they are not milked anymore until they give birth. The first group of about 14 cows were taken to a grass field to join the in-calf heifers and our Angus bull Faithful.

On a walk around the farm during the week I noticed that this year there is an abundance of pink mallow lining the sides of tracks. The fruits of common mallow are round and have cheese-like wedges giving rise to its nickname 'the cheese plant'.