Tracmaster kindly agreed to come and show the new BCS 780 power unit in action, along with a couple of attachments: the 66cm rotovator with the precision depth roller behind, and the 85cm Berta flail mower. The day started with us looking over the new unit which has hydrostatic drive, making it more like driving an automatic machine than a manual since it doesn’t have the gear levers that those of us with a BC740 are more used to. It has a more nuanced lever to select ‘gear’ or effort, or reverse, giving you more than the typical three speeds. It still has the usual revs lever too.
The depth roller also offers more adjustability when it comes to making a seed bed, choosing the depth you want, so hopefully preventing more pans in the soil when rotovating since the rotovator depth choices are very limited. The finish on our good sandy loam was nice and even, and probably firmer and less fluffy than rotovating alone would have created.
The flail mower was interesting; it coped as well as you’d expect on the overly grassy paths and wild headlands, mulching well as it went. However when it came to the green manure ley which was thick with old crimson clover stalks as well as lucerne, the mower struggled and Stuart from Tracmaster was rather taken aback. He assumed the mower would be fine with it, but was unable to finish a whole row; the semi-dried stems just wrapped thickly around the flail bar. I had previously snapped a chain in my old Rescia flail mower on my BCS740 on the same crop a few weeks before; so I think the moral is not to grow such a high percentage of crimson or red tall-growing clovers unless they will be mown with a tractor-mounted flail, where the height can be adjusted more; or else mow the crop sooner when it is shorter and more tender – but then miss out on those gorgeous flowers!
After the demo we thanked Stuart, then had a walk round the field and polytunnels; the field is split into five patches with the rotation of green manure, brassicas (mostly kales with kohl rabi, cabbage, turnips, broccoli and cauliflower), alliums (mostly leeks with some shallots), market garden crops (lettuces, salad leaves, beetroot, chard, spinach, parsley, coriander, broad beans, sweetcorn), outdoor curcubits (some courgettes and pumpkins but mostly squash), which were undersown with green manures at the end of June. The tunnels currently hold tomatoes with some chillies and aubergines; climbing beans and cucumbers; leek transplants followed by Persian clover; and basil, with the smaller tunnels housing salad and garlic remnants.
Our market is mostly wholesale, which works because there is a farm shop and cafe on site, and sales also go to nearby shops, event catering and box schemes, plus a small 25-person custom veg round to very local addresses only. We had lots of interesting discussions, from irrigation and how we tend not to water our field crops much other than leafy salads (we water when planted out, and if another heatwave in summer, otherwise we rely on the soil, weed/ground cover and shady enviromesh), to the need for more consistent training and apprenticeships. Thanks to all that attended!
For more information on the BCS and parts diagrams, visit the Tracmaster website.
Grown Green @ Hartley Farm 