LONGEST SUMMER

[Highlander]

Longest summer since records began. That's what the metrological people are saying and talking about the effects that is having on plants and animals. So what about Woody?

 

Round here the rape is coming along apace although Woody hasn't shown too much interest in it as yet (most opportunities are in the woods on the acorns and beech mast) BUT what'll happen by the time they are. If things continue as they are even for a few more weeks the rape will be well up by the time Woody might want to get on it and then it'll be too late and useless to them. So what then? Winter die offs, mass migrations, etc and what about other wild quarry, snipe, woodcock, wildfowl etc will their habits alter?

 

Are we in for a time of change?

[Pedro]

I was thinking exactly the same the other day about the rape. The farmers who got the seed in early on are going to have a bumper crop, (presuming the rest of the growth goes to plan).

One of my permissions was a bit late getting his in and it hasn't grown nearly as much as elsewhere, ( :look: ).

I walked around it the other day and there's evidence of pigeon feeding on it, but because it's been sown over such a big acreage, they're not hitting it badly in any particular spots.

The other farm got his in well early and the crop's huge now, with no evidence of feeding whatsoever.

Surely there can't be much of the growing season left? I know most plants are dictated too by day length, is this the case for OSR?

I suppose we'll just have to wait and see

 

P.

[sandersj89]

Rape being too far ahead at this time of year is not always a good thing when it comes to yield next year. The large plants can be pulled right back by bad weather.

 

Farming is a fine balance!

 

Jerry

[M ROBSON]

If things continue as they are even for a few more weeks the rape will be well up by the time Woody might want to get on it and then it'll be too late and useless to them.

 

What makes you think that??

 

We've had great bags of Woodies on winter rape in spring, when some patches are knee high and the rest of the field is in flower!

 

I've watched birds pile into fully grown (5 foot high) game crop Kale when it was thick with snow on the ground.

 

You may see them ignore tall rape when they have plenty of other things to choose from, in hard times they soon find the food and they aren't often that fussy.

 

Mark.

[henry d]

If we get a good fall of snow everything will change too and have the continental birds decided to stay a while longer before going south/west ?

 

Personally I think we are having a blip just as 1976,for those who were about then,was a hotty.Not to mention January 1993 I think it was,when we had 3ft of snow one week then the next it went up to 10"C and rain for 4 days = major flooding.

[sandersj89]

If we get a good fall of snow everything will change too and have the continental birds decided to stay a while longer before going south/west ?

 

Personally I think we are having a blip just as 1976,for those who were about then,was a hotty.Not to mention January 1993 I think it was,when we had 3ft of snow one week then the next it went up to 10"C and rain for 4 days = major flooding.

 

'76 was a mad year in the south west, in Feb we were snowed in at the farm for 2 weeks, the lanes filled with snow over night and we had to dig our way out with a JCB. The sheep suffered and it took us 2 or 3 weeks to dig them all out of the drifts but they fared OK in the main. 2 weeks of school so it was not all bad.

 

Then come the summer the place was like a desert, not a blade of green grass for months. The sheep did not do so well then and we had to buy in feed from late July, unheard of.

 

As for kale or rape being too tall for pigeons, if the weather is hard enough they will come to it, and remember they can easily land ontop of kale to feed, the plants are easily strong enough to support their weight.

 

Jerry

[mossy835]

If we get a good fall of snow everything will change too and have the continental birds decided to stay a while longer before going south/west ?

 

Personally I think we are having a blip just as 1976,for those who were about then,was a hotty.Not to mention January 1993 I think it was,when we had 3ft of snow one week then the next it went up to 10"C and rain for 4 days = major flooding.

 

i can remember 1976, boy that was a hot one.

[kdubya]

Might be bucking the trend here? BUT yes I know its still relatively warm, and all things green are still growing ie my lawn! but tuesday gone I got a call off a farmer who asked me if I was going to shoot pigeon again this winter, YES I replied no problem, and said I think it will be a while yet before they start hitting your fields as they are all on acorn & beechmast, to which his reply was well thats strange as they are hitting the rape NOW, so I agreed to meet him expecting to see birds dropping from the woods for fallen nuts, but yep birds were feeding on rape, not a lot and only in one area but feeding none the less, might try a bit of a session next week just to see if they will come in?

cheers KW

[pin]

I saw them hitting rape on the way to work this morning down the m11 in essex, and a lot more moving about...

[Highlander]

If, if we have a hard winter down here we might see Woody on taller rape but it's my experience that they will usually stick to those bits that are poor and low, maybe even keeping a patch in such a condition but as for alighting on tall well grown rape it'd have to be a poor hard winter for them to do that readily.

 

Unusually a lot of beet is being harvested at the moment which we'd normally expect to see Woody on after hard frosty weather. As yet I've not seen a bird on it so a waste from a shooters point of view.

 

At the moment there's hardly a bird to be seen on the fields but plenty in the woods, just a shame the woods are full of partridges and pheasants too.