FOR a change the weather during the last week has been uneventful. The days have been mainly sunny, but often there was a chilly breeze. Not surprising as the roar of the motorway has been almost inaudible, indicating that the rather cool feeling air was coming from a northerly direction.

Farmers are still very busy catching up with all the delayed field work caused by the prolonged period of wet weather, but at last on Manor, Stowell and Chuggaton Farms all the necessary applications of fertilisers, herbicides and fungicides have been applied to the growing crops.

Last weekend Richard and I went to the Wiltshire Young Farmers' Rally, which was held on Lower Odd Farm, near Malmesbury. It is a day when YFC clubs from all over the county take part in a number of competitions, some are static, others held on the day and some events, including stock judging and shooting, held on a number of farms prior to rally day.

This year the theme was Fairytales, so classes such as cookery, photography, craft and floral art, performing a magic trick and even building a dog kennel out of recycled pallets had to be connected to the theme.

The competitors all produced very good displays, with granddaughter Natasha winning the fairy cake decorating class, which was held on the day.

Our other granddaughter Annabel, together with Emily, another Chippenham YFC member, won the hair and make up class, in which Annabel was dressed and made up by Emily to look like a fairytale character, their choice was Sleeping Beauty.

All these classes were judged in the morning, whilst in the afternoon there were a number of main ring attractions, including a race involving decorated lawnmowers. Well done to all the YFC members who took part, with congratulations to Malmesbury, the overall winners, with Chippenham in second place and Devizes third.

Another recently attended event was Grassland UK. This is a triennial event, which was held this year on a working farm adjacent to the Bath and West Showground and organised by showground staff. Richard and I were stewards on a section of the 100-acre site, which showcases every aspect of forage production, from seeds to feeds. There were machinery demonstrations, including silage making from cutting the standing crop through all processes to putting the grass in a silage clamp or baling it into large bales, which were wrapped in plastic. There were even muck and slurry handling demonstrations. The show attracts 8,000 visitors from across the UK and Europe, also providing them with expert advice and seminars covering a variety of grassland related topics. It was a very interesting day being able to see such a large number of working machines demonstrating all the latest technological advances in grass handling. It was an impressive sight!

On Manor and Chuggaton Farms the first cut of grass is now safely in the silage clamps. This year we sent some grass samples away for analysis, particularly because fertiliser was applied later than usual. This could have meant the grass was high in nitrogen, due to the sudden late growth.

The grass samples were found to be a little high in nitrogen, so we were advised to delay cutting for a day or two. Once we started cutting the grass was left to wilt for 36 to 48 hours before Simon, our contractor, arrived to pick up and chop the grass with his forage harvester. Richard, Nathan and Kevin hauled the chopped grass back to the silage barn where it was piled up into a into a wedge shape before being covered with a plastic sheet. Excluding air ensures that we get anaerobic fermentation, during which time lactic acid bacteria break down the sugars until a pH of between 3.8 and 4.2 is reached.

Denise Plummer