Europe is, like Africa, an underdeveloped continent when it comes adoption of Conservation Agriculture (CA). It has 7.3 million hectares under CA compared to 1.2 million ha for Africa. However, the scenario is changing, and changing fast for both continents, as was confirmed by a team from the African Conservation Agriculture Network for Africa (ACT) in a recent visit to Thurlby Grange Farm and discussions with Tony Reynolds no-till CA farmer and President of the CA UK Farmers’ Association.

The visit to the farm had been organised by Prof Amir Kassam, Moderator of the FAO-hosted Global Platform for Conservation Agriculture Community of Practice (CA-CoP) and Chairperson of the International Conservation Agriculture Advisory Panel for Africa (ICAAP-Africa). It was also attended by the ACT Executive Secretary (Eng. Saidi Mkomwa), Philip Wanjohi (ACT Finance and Business Development Manager), and Dan Bradley (Design Engineer) and Sam Kent both of Weaving Machinery Ltd (www.weavingmachinery.net). Weaving Machinery are the manufacturers of the new Weaving GD inclined disc no-till drills, described by engineers as a quantum leap forward in no till technology.

Tony abandoned his ploughs and harrows in 2006, to transform his farm from high energy-and capital-demanding plough-based agriculture to 100 percent low-energy no-till farming system. After an initial dip in fields with higher clay content, his yields of cereals and oilseed rape have regained and surpassed pre-switch levels, as the soil regained its health and vigour. Oilseed rape yields are now 5 ton/ha and the combine has recorded wheat yields hovering around the 13 ton/ha mark. Oats, direct drilled after harvest, is gaining popularity as a cover crop in the UK and is practised by Tony Gent. Tony takes pride in divulging the detail of the benefits of no-till agriculture. For example, the 2013 level of soil organic matter at Home Farm reached 6.26 percent which is way above the average figure for the type of soil as recommended by DEFRA (refer to his power point presentation for details). Earthworm counts are currently at 153/m2 compared with 25/m2 under conventional tillage. Water infiltration has improved exponentially and, of course, wild life numbers (of, for example, hares, lapwings and skylarks) are soaring. Crop production costs have plummeted (from £266 to £30/ha for wheat): an important component is overall fuel use, which has dropped from 96 to 41 litres/ha over ten years.

Blackgrass (Alopecurus myosuroides), which has become a barely-controllable menace in the UK’s cereal growing regions, has been practically eliminated on the farm. As Tony explains, 80 percent of blackgrass seeds perish each year in undisturbed soil, so only 20 percent of the previous year’s seed bank will germinate. After 10 years of no-till, the remainder can be hand-rogued as required. In the Weaving GD6000T (Figure below) no-till drill, seed (and fertiliser if required) is delivered (via the pneumatic metering system) to the double offset disc soil openers. The novel aspect of this machine is that the discs are inclined at 25º to the vertical and trail the machine through being mounted on a king-pin system. The discs slice the soil and lift the top slice, allowing the seeds to be spread over a >50 mm band before the soil slice falls back in place. A rear compacting wheel leaves the soil looking practically undisturbed with minimal straw hair-pinning. Tony believes that the machine represents a quantum leap forward in no-till drill technology.

The three farms owned by Tony have a total area of 1250 hectares; 100 ha being pasture feeding 150 beef cattle and hens. There are 16,000 free-range Lohmann brown hens which are brought in at 16 weeks old and sold off at 72 weeks. The poultry house produces 6-7 tonnes of manure per week. The birds produce “happy eggs” destined for the supermarkets of the UK. The manure, on the other hand, is destined to raise the fertility of the farm’s soils in a neat integration of enterprises.

Acknowledgement

Very many thanks to Tony, Ruth and their family for their generous hospitality.

Saidi Mkomwa, Philip Wanjohi and Amir Kassam