July Guest Speaker Report

Our speaker this month was Hannah Mitchell from Agrii, the UK`s leading agronomy and agricultural services company, which provides independent advice for farmers and growers, helping them to grow crops as sustainably and productively as possible.

There are several types of agronomic consultants – Field, commercial, environmental, specialist and research and development. Hannah explained how soil is the key driver to everything, and must be replenished to keep producing crops. The technology available today can help to pinpoint which
areas of fields are in need of extra fertilisers or irrigation, which prevents the need to treat the whole field, thereby saving time and money.

Crops grown in the UK include wheat, oats, potatoes, maize, barley, rape, beans, sugar beet and of course grass. The USA grows the same variety of potato in the same place each year, and these crops are very susceptible to blight. Blight resistant varieties are needed to prevent over-use of chemicals to try and eradicate pests and diseases.

Companion planting can be used to confuse pests and some of these crops will feed the soil as well. Hannah explained that technology will be a big part of farming in the future. The personal touch could well be lost but the technology is more accurate, albeit very expensive. Examples of this technology include drones, unmanned tractors and irrigation probes.

Hannah`s working day varied depending on the season – less in winter but very long days in the spring for example. She does a lot of travelling around the areas visiting farms and interacting with the farmers, but other days she could be working alone. There is also computer work to be done, but Hannah clearly enjoys being out in the countryside, surrounded by nature, advising and supporting our food producers.

Many thanks to Hannah for a very different and interesting talk. Also thanks to everyone who attended as usual. 

There will not be a speaker in August as it is our 50th annual show on the 15th which draws all our focus, but our September speaker will be Mark Ashton chatting all things Dahlias, Gladioli and Chrysanths.