With history repeating itself now is the time to ‘Think Change’
With lacklustre world commodity prices squeezing profitability, the situation in farming today parallels that in 2002 when I was forced to reduce production costs or see the family’s arable enterprise in Suffolk go out of business. The crop establishment I invented then has ensured that the Claydon family farm has made a profit every year since, even before taking account of government payments.
20 November 2025
Farming is a commercial business for my family, so we continually review what we do and how we do it. Our objective is to operate as efficiently as possible to maximise profitability.
Twenty-three years ago the feed wheat price fell below £60/t; it was impossible to make money growing combinable crops as we had done for decades. To remain financially viable we had to change how we farmed and reduce our production costs, without compromising yields. We did that by moving away from conventional plough and min-till-based establishment to a unique form of direct seeding.
The direct drill which I designed dramatically reduced the machinery, time, fuel and labour required to establish our crops, and therefore our costs. Over the years we developed a holistic approach to crop establishment which transformed our farm’s economic and ecological sustainability. Simple, practical, fast and ultra-efficient, Claydon Opti-Till® has also brought tremendous improvements in timeliness, soil structure, soil biota and our quality of life.
Those early days highlighted the importance of considering the next crop at the point of harvest. This way of thinking formed the foundation of a stubble management programme based around the Straw Harrow which allowed us to effectively control volunteers and weeds, as well as slugs which were more of an issue when we grew oilseed rape.
Subsequently we developed the TerraStar®, a light rotary harrow which is still used occasionally to level uneven ground on new contract fields or to create a little more tilth than the Straw Harrow in adverse conditions. This versatile implement can also be used to incorporate/mix large amounts of straw, manures and compost.
Throughout the 24 years that the Claydon farm has been direct seeded our crops have consistently yielded on a par or more than those established using conventional cultivation methods, while weather risks have been largely eliminated because no cultivated land is left exposed to the elements.
Fuel use is now incredibly low, just 40 to 50 l/ha last season including all stubble management operations, drilling, spraying, fertiliser application, inter-row hoeing with our 6m Claydon TerraBlade, harvesting and corn carting. Tractor hours have fallen by 80%, and in three years our main drilling tractor, a 2022 Fendt 942, has only just passed 1200 hours even though in 2025 it drilled the farm with our 6m Claydon Evolution two and a half times (catch, companion, main crop). Wear and tear, servicing costs and depreciation are all significantly lower.
The benefits of this approach have been reflected in our bottom line; excluding support payments, the Claydon farm has made a profit every year. Given that governments of all political persuasions have a habit of changing their minds like the wind we feel that is a good position to be in and every year I wager with my accountant that we will make a profit just from growing crops.
Profits are largely reinvested in the farm, whether to keep machinery up to date or in longer-term projects such as field drainage. Doing so puts us on a sound footing for the future.
Sadly, the previous Integrated Administration and Control System (IACS) payments are no longer, but for the fortunate few, SFI has offset the lost income. A key factor is that direct seeding is helping us to take advantage of SFI payments which currently match those of the IACS.
SFI has made farming very interesting and ensures that the business remains profitable. We have found that direct seeding a catch cover crop within hours of combining the previous crop has helped to conserve moisture. In a dry year such as 2025 this approach greatly assisted the cover crop to establish as well as encouraging volunteers and grassweeds to grow so that they can be taken out later.
Following spring oats this approach proved so successful that by mid-September the tail oats were dominating the cover crop, so it was sprayed off on 10 September, a little earlier than planned. Once the residues had died back we used our Straw Harrow to kill a flush of grassweeds and followed in with the drill, direct seeding winter wheat from 22 September until 2 October. Our agronomists were not amused that it went in so early!
Conditions were much better than in the previous two years when drilling into wet Hanslope series clay, while the wet, windy weather which followed compromised blackgrass control as we couldn’t get chemicals on at the optimum time. In complete contrast, this autumn we were able to roll everything behind the drill, then apply Avadex and pre-emergence sprays within two or three days.
Our initial concern that establishing cover crops under SFI would be challenging due to time constraints proved ill-founded. Direct seeding directly behind the combine while there is still moisture in the soil has paid off, the only downside being that it happened so quickly that we did not have time to bale anything and the oat straw would have fetched a good price.
Recently, I talked to a farmer who had been direct seeding using a disc-type drill, moving almost no soil, and after noticing some stratification of the soil layers reverted to ploughing to mix the layers. Soil stratification will never be an issue with Opti-Till® because the standard leading tine system on all Claydon direct drills avoids this and consequently eliminates any need for low-disturbance subsoiling to remedy the problem. The leading tine doesn’t have to be run deep every year, just on a sensible basis according to conditions and what you see from looking at the soil. For some crops you will run it a little bit deeper, for others slightly shallower and for best results we recommend drilling at a slight angle to the previous crop.
TIMING IS EVERYTHING
Timing is everything in farming and keeping it simple is the key. Operating full RTK guidance we don’t need to put tramlines in with the drill and can come back in the spring with the TerraBlade inter-row hoe to take out any weeds growing between the band-seeded rows. Reducing weed competition in this way has significantly increased yields and any slight concerns we had about going through the spring oats at an early growth stage proved unfounded.
All our winter wheat for 2026 harvest was planted early, in excellent conditions. Fields destined for spring oats were sprayed off in September, a few days earlier than planned, to take out the catch cover crop/grassweeds/volunteers then the over-wintered cover crop was direct seeded into the residues. It is now growing strongly and will be taken out prior to drilling the spring oats, along with any grassweeds that have emerged since we sprayed off the catch cover crop. That’s where the real value of this approach lies and it works a treat.
I am seriously impressed with the way the farm looks this season now that we have fully integrated cover crops into our regime, even though it has been a learning curve for me and the team. Having gone down the SFI route we are seeing considerable advantages in terms of improved weed control from using just one spray of glyphosate to take out the cover crop and the weed rake (Straw Harrow) to remove most of the remaining blackgrass pre-drilling.
Before sitting down to write this article on 20 November I drove around the farm and saw that all our cover crops are in excellent condition. Our wheat is also in great shape going into the winter months, being strong, competitive and very clean considering it was drilled earlier than normal. Elsoms Bamford impressed last season, and we sold it for a small premium, so we are growing it again. Some might say that’s a bit risky, because if that variety fails you’ve no fallback position, but having just one variety of soft milling wheat makes it easy to manage the grain store.
TIME TO TAKE STOCK
Record harvests across the world during 2025 have led to lacklustre commodity prices and as long as ample supplies remain available I see no reason why they will increase significantly.
Against that backdrop I am pleased that we farm the way we farm, as Opti-Till® reduces risk and provides a simple, fast, low-cost method of establishing any crop that can be air sown.
My goal is to remain profitable, even before government funding, and the bottom line is that, before subsidies, which are becoming more of an unknown quantity, we have achieved that every year for 23 years. The solution that worked for us back in 2002, by greatly reducing establishment costs and producing consistently high yields, still works for us today and gets better year-on-year.
If we are to continue farming it is important not to fall into the trap of using machinery until it wears, because patching up old kit to keep it running will cost money, both directly and through inefficiency. Currently you have five years to average profits, so before getting into a situation where you have five years of loss, make the changes which will help you farm efficiently and profitably.
No one will argue that times are tough; the question is what can you do about it? Rather than burying heads in the sand and hoping that everything will come good in the end (spoiler: it won’t), those who are determined to stay in farming will review what they are doing and implement changes to maximise profitability.
With harvest and autumn work out of the way now is a good time to evaluate the considerable benefits that are described in the Claydon THINK campaign; we developed this to demonstrate how Opti-Till® reduces the time and cost of establishment by almost 50%. It also demonstrates how our customers improve yields and benefit soil health to deliver healthier, more sustainable, more profitable crops.
Details can be found at claydondrill.com/think-change/
Jeff Claydon, CEO & Farmer
November 2026