Below-average yields and low prices this harvest underline the importance of maximising efficiency across every aspect of crop production, emphasises Jeff Claydon, Suffolk arable farmer and inventor of the Claydon Opti-Till® direct seeding system.
26 August 2025
In the article I wrote last August I mentioned that after an exceedingly difficult season crops on our own and many other farms could best be summarised as ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.’
Unfortunately, the challenges continued into 2024/25, which brought variable weather, below-average yields and low cereal prices. On the Claydon farm, despite an optimistic start to the season, yields were 15% to 20% down, disappointing but nowhere near as bad as some have experienced. With feed wheat futures currently languishing at £160 per tonne, well under half the £360 per tonne on offer in May 2022, it has become much more difficult to make a profit.
I know that you probably don’t want to hear it, but when things are at their toughest the key is to Think Change. That was the situation we faced in 2002 when grain prices fell below £60 per tonne. It was impossible to make a profit at this level, putting the future of our family farm in question. To survive we had to reduce our cost base, a key part of which was to significantly change how crops were established – conventional methods had become just too expensive.
At the time there was nothing on the market which would do what we wanted, so I decided to design a direct drill. This dramatically reduced the amount of time, machinery, fuel and labour required. What subsequently developed into the Claydon Opti-Till® System has been a game-changer. It has transformed the economic and ecological sustainability of our farm. It is simple, practical, fast and low-cost. It has also improved timeliness, soil structure, soil biota and quality of life.
After some difficult seasons many businesses will be questioning what changes are needed to ensure that they are agronomically and financially viable going forward. Understandably, many will want to carry on as before, but against the current backdrop facing the farming sector doing nothing is unlikely to be a viable option. Investing in more efficient, more effective ways of working could help to ensure that you have a sustainable business for the future.
A CHALLENGING SEASON
On the Claydon farm we made significant changes to our cropping for 2024/25. Growing oilseed rape had become a struggle, primarily due to the increasing damage caused by cabbage stem flea beetle following the ban on neonicotinoids. Lacklustre yields combined with prices which did not warrant the high financial and agronomic risks were other reasons why we decided to stop. Instead, we extended the wheat area to two-thirds, while the remainder went into spring oats, providing a good opportunity to control grassweeds using a combination of chemical and mechanical methods.
Opti-Till® has been used here for the last twenty-three years, so our heavy Hanslope Series clay soils are in excellent condition and very well structured. This stood us in good stead last season. The lack of rain, just 60mm from March until harvest, was a serious issue and yields were 15% to 20% down on our long-term averages. I have just sold 116 tonnes of wheat to make space in our grain store for machinery, but hopefully £160/t will not be the highest achieved in the next few months.
Having heard reports of wheat yields as low as 7t/ha, and beans down to 1t/ha, we are not too disappointed but had hoped for better results this season. Winter wheats were variable, averaging 8t/ha, 2t/ha below our long-term figure, with areas drilled in October yielding 10% more than those which went in during November. Elsoms Bamford was our star performer, so we will be growing the variety again in 2025/26.
Elsoms Lion spring oats averaged 5.8t/ha, ranging from 5.25t/ha to 6t+/ha. The highest yield came from an 18ha block where we took out weeds between the rows with our 6m TerraBlade. Despite initial concerns that this might have caused some damage to the emerging crop it was obviously not the case.
We were fortunate to secure the SFI area we applied for last year, three 85ha blocks, and have received some payments, for which we are grateful given below-par yields this harvest. The companion crop of beans planted under SFI did not feature at harvest, having stalled at GS32 due to the dry weather combined with competition from the wheat and oats.
We are always questioning what we do and host numerous trials on the farm. The dry weather meant that last season the trials produced no definitive results, but we will continue and, as for the last 45 years, we will measure the yields and decide whether a process or product is worthwhile on a commercial scale.
FAST TURNAROUND
Harvest was a somewhat drawn-out and frustrating affair because of the frequent showers. In aggregate, they amounted to less than 13mm over four weeks but crops often took two or three days to dry out enough to allow the combine to roll again. We started the wheat on 15 July and by the end of the month had finished the spring oats, completing the last field of wheat on 9 August.
We turned the farm around in an amazing time this year. During the last two years we have corrected areas of sub-standard drainage with plastic mains and laterals, overlayed with mole drains, so here’s no need to do anything this season. Our soils are now in an ideal condition for direct drilling.
In between the showers which halted harvesting our 6m Claydon Evolution drill was hard at work. Its high output and low seed rate meant cover crops were established very quickly using just 8 litres of diesel per hectare.
Drilling immediately behind the combine can be extremely challenging where there is a high volume of chopped material, particularly spring oat straw which can be very ‘clingy.’ Our 15m Claydon Straw Harrow was used behind the Fendt 724 Vario to distribute chopped straw evenly across the field which improved the situation no end. After a day of dry weather it flowed through the drill with no issues.
This season we are experimenting with three cover crop mixes. It will be interesting to compare the performance of crops which follow the cover crops and those where we just used the Straw Harrow to take out weeds and volunteers. We will use it up until the first week of September and then apply glyphosate to take out any remaining volunteers before direct drilling wheat with our 6m Claydon Evolution.
Farming is not a hobby for the Claydon family; it is a commercial enterprise, so we continually embrace change and operate as efficiently as possible. Using Opti-Till® total fuel use across all the operations required to produce cereal crops is 40 to 50 l/ha, a fraction of what it would be with a conventional system. That includes all stubble management operations, drilling, spraying, fertiliser application, inter-row hoeing with the Claydon TerraBlade, harvesting and corn carting. Plus all the savings in time and extra machinery needed, and risks involved with the extra workloads, weather, etc, with conventional tillage
Opti-Till® has also reduced tractor hours by 80 per cent, while wear and tear, servicing costs and depreciation are all significantly lower, leaving more ‘margin’, which benefits everyone involved. Time saving is another increasingly important benefit given that I and my two sons, Oliver and Spencer, also manage the Claydon agricultural machinery manufacturing business. Being so efficient, it allows us to use time more productively and have some left over for more interesting things, be it spending time with the children / grandchildren or being able to take time off to go shooting.