GPS-driven variable-rate seed sowing saved a Wiltshire farm nearly £3/ha (£1.20/acre) last autumn and has produced some encouragingly uniform crops going into the spring.
The Courtyard Partnership's Intelligent Precision Farming zone-seeding approach, automatically adjusting seed rates to different soil types (Arable, 21 Sept 2007), was used for all autumn drillings at Ramsbury Estate, Marlborough, says manager Duncan Lee.
"If you take this figure over our whole winter cereal and oilseed rape area of 1780ha, we are making a significant saving."
But savings alone can prove a false economy. So has the zone seeding idea delivered?
Clearly, the final proof won't be available until harvest, but initial results look promising despite some less-than-helpful material in last season's seed, Mr Lee believes.
"We were aiming at 650 tillers/sq m, and although the germination level was fine, I have a feeling that the seed vigour wasn't generally as good as we had hoped.
"We normally expect to get 80% establishment, but some has been as low as 60%, and some of the smaller plants have been out-competed by bigger ones."
Nevertheless, detailed counts on two wheat fields after beans - chosen for their relative freedom from rabbits, slugs and other interfering factors - show tiller numbers ranging from 550 to 600 over several soil types.
"The seed rate on the best of these we set at 175/sq m, and it went up to 225 on the clay cap. It was actually slightly lower than it might have been because we drilled on 12 September as opposed to our target of the 20th."
Mr Lee and Courtyard's Vince Gillingham admit there is still much to learn, not least about where to pitch specific seed rates to the soil zones and sowing dates. Last seasons' levels were chosen jointly with Masstock agronomist Jim Hynes.
