Mike Abram

Unlocking the power of soils Three practical days featuring US soil biology researcher Dr Elaine Ingham about unlocking the power of soil were run by Soil Ecology Laboratory last November. Direct Driller visited the one held i…

Last for now another new article for Direct Driller: a visit with Dr Elaine Ingham and her team looking to unlock soil potential. A lot of compost talk! directdriller.com/unlocking-th...

New genomic technologies flex their potential Billions are being invested in gene editing globally, but what innovations will that investment deliver? Tech Farmer visited the World AgriTech Innovation Summit to gain a global perspective on wha…

Also new in Direct Driller from same World AgriTech Innovation Summit in San Francisco a deeper dive into gene editing potential. Some exciting possibilities discussed: directdriller.com/new-genomic-...

First look: Innovations that might be on your farm Around 2,500 delegates attended the World AgriTech Innovation Summit in San Francisco in March. Mike Abram went along to hear about some new exciting innovations. If you’re the CEO or founder of an…

New article for Direct Driller about latest agtech innovations, although the info is from the World AgriTech Innovation Summit in San Francisco last March! directdriller.com/first-look-i...

How Arable Insights farmer panel are unlocking soil improvements - Farmers Weekly Managing soils to improve physical structure and chemical and biological activity has become a key trend on arable farms this decade. Each of this

New article for @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social: latest in the series with 8 arable growers from around the country, this one taking a deeper dive into their tried and trusted tactics for improving soil health, plus some new thinking. www.fwi.co.uk/arable/land-...

How the market-leading farm management system is changing - Farmers Weekly New-look, cloud-based digital farm management software incorporating the best elements of the well-known market-leading Gatekeeper and Muddy Boots crop

New-ish in @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social: How the marketing leading farm management / crop recording system from Telus is changing. Will it be enough to ward off the challenges from some of the new kids on the block though? www.fwi.co.uk/arable/crop-...

Weather helps reduce beet virus yellows risk - Farmers Weekly Virus yellows risk in sugar beet is reducing following cold weather in January and early February, according to the British Beet Research Organisation’s

New-ish article in @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social: Good news for sugar beet growers in that virus yellows risk seems lower this season. From BBRO BeetTech25 event in February.
www.fwi.co.uk/arable/sugar...

Impossible dream: Self- fertilising cereal crops? Is it possible to create cereal crops that provide their own nutrition? In a bid to find out, CPM talks to researchers...

It's the holy grail of plant science: developing cereal crops that source their own nitrogen to do away with fertilisers.

@dromius.bsky.social tells @mikeabram.bsky.social how the Enabling Nutrient Symbioses in Agriculture (ENSA) project is making headway.

www.cpm-magazine.co.uk/varieties/im...

Impossible dream: Self- fertilising cereal crops? Is it possible to create cereal crops that provide their own nutrition? In a bid to find out, CPM talks to researchers...

Also in CPM magazine in February: Researchers trying to do the (almost?) impossible and create cereal crops that provide their own nutrition. (Print version also has panel on whether free-living bacteria can supply nitrogen). www.cpm-magazine.co.uk/varieties/im...

CUPGRA: Pricing position strength for potato growers Optimism towards price negotiations, the role of innovative technology, & new tools for technical challenges at the CUPGRA potato conference.

First CPM magazine articles of the year in the February issue. This one a report from the excellent CUPGRA conference in December (minus a side panel on seed supply headaches in the print version!). www.cpm-magazine.co.uk/roots/cupgra...

How new technology enables yield mapping for root crops - Farmers Weekly In-field yield mapping of root crops, such as sugar beet and potatoes, is tricky compared with grain crops, not least because of the added complication of

Missed this new article from earlier in the week: Did you know you can yield map root crops as well as combinable ones?
Ben Burgess fitting and incorporating
Greentronics system on beet (and potato) harvesters.
@farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social www.fwi.co.uk/arable/harve...

Weather helps reduce beet virus yellows risk - Farmers Weekly Virus yellows risk in sugar beet is reducing following cold weather in January and early February, according to the British Beet Research Organisation’s

New article: Virus yellows risk decreasing for sugar beet growers thanks to cold weather in Jan and early Feb. Report from #BeetTech25 for @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social

www.fwi.co.uk/arable/sugar...

Arable Insights Farmers' strategies to optimise nutrient use - Farmers Weekly From organic manures to use of technology and various monitoring approaches, all the growers on  Farmers Weekly Arable Insights Farmer panel have an eye

A look at how our 2024/25 Arable Insights farmer panel are planning nutrition strategies in the coming season. Lots of use of organic amendments, tools and a conversation on how low is too low. @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social www.fwi.co.uk/arable/crop-...

Which probably leaves insurance and risk sharing by British Sugar as best short term solution so will be interesting to see if more take up that option next season, or indeed re-opened for this season, etc.

Help is coming with resistant / more tolerant varieties but currently there are significant yield penalties and they only really protect against one type of virus yellows, I think. There’s a gene editing project which could help in the medium term.

The 40% last year were helped mostly by a kind spring (for virus yellows control). Other insecticides will have helped too. But nothing will prevent virus if the weather goes against growers - remember 2020. Nothing much has changed since then.

What alternatives Vicki? As far as I am aware there is currently nothing (chemical, varietal, other) anywhere near as effective at preventing virus yellows apart from cold weather (which I don’t think BS can control)! Agree on price but that’s already set for season, and too late for insurance.

Why a long-term no-tiller is ploughing again on heavy soils - Farmers Weekly For more than 20 years, a bare brown field has not been seen on Motts Farm on the Dengie peninsula in Essex, with crops established using zero tillage.

Enjoyed visiting this well-known long term no-till farmer about why he's turned back to the plough. And it wasn't just for one reason! @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social www.fwi.co.uk/arable/land-...

How to bolster financial resilience on farm - Farmers Weekly Recent Budget changes, including to agricultural property relief (APR) and business property relief (BPR), have only added to the inherent financial

An important topic given everything happening in farming currently - how to bolster financial resilience. @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social Transition special. www.fwi.co.uk/business/bus...

How composting is helping organic transition on Norfolk farm - Farmers Weekly Making and using compost to improve soil health has become a central part of the route Ken Hill Farm & Estate is taking to transition to an organic

Another @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social article from a Soil Ecology Laboratory event featuring @wildkenhill.bsky.social Nick Padwick about how composting is improving soil health and helping power the farm's organic transition. Lots of practical advice about composting!

www.fwi.co.uk/arable/land-...

Do soya bean crops have a future in the UK? - Farmers Weekly Could soya beans eventually become a break crop of choice for UK growers? Currently, that’s difficult to believe with no more than 200ha grown in the UK

Enjoyed researching this one on whether soya beans have a future in the UK? The journey started in Belgium on a press trip where it became clear that a lot of research on soy and other pulse crops is happening. Published in @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social

www.fwi.co.uk/arable/other...

3 adoption steps for AI to transform arable farming - Farmers Weekly Technologies using artificial intelligence (AI) are primed to progressively change the way we farm, ultimately leading to a fundamental shift in the way

Thread of my articles in farming magazines in 2025. Strictly speaking this was one of the last articles of 2024 - 3 adoptions steps for #AI to transform arable farming - from Agri-Tech E's REAP Conference. For @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social www.fwi.co.uk/arable/crop-...

Last year I wanted to create a thread of all my article for various farming magazines during the year over on the other place but failed miserably to do so. Let's see how long I can remember to do this for this year! (Next post will be #1).

It all feels like 2009 again. But this time trying to find old friends in the vain hope this place will become a bit more like the other place used to be.