Saya Harvey
Farm Manager
The Allerton Project is delighted to announce the appointment of our new Farm Manager Saya Harvey. Saya has worked for The Allerton Project for over 5 years but as Training Manager delivering the Certificate in Sustainable Land Management course.
Saya brings with her a lifetime of experience and enthusiasm which all started at a critical time of the farming year back in August. We took the time to catch up with her once she had her wellies firmly planted!
When did you start?
I took over early August in the middle of harvest which didn’t give much time to get to know the farm ahead of making post harvest field management decisions! There seems to have been an endless number of drainage issues that have presented themselves since then so mud has been the over riding feature of my first few months, especially after the heavy rainfall mid September.
What are the key things you are looking to achieve in the short term and longer term?
We are beginning to get the drainage under control and have drilled 10 hectares of Oil seed rape which is still a viable crop and 52 hectares of winter wheat. Winter cover crops are established on 60 hectares of land and we are planning to put this and a further 17 hectares into spring crops including beans, barley and oats so we are hoping for a kind spring! The main issues on the farm are drainage and black grass which is a common theme for many farms in the area. Aging drainage schemes that need some maintenance and a black grass seed bank that has built up over the past few wet autumns will need some careful attention or the farm will quickly become unfarmable. So we will be shifting our emphasis to spring cropping on the worst fields and working hard to get fields mole ploughed, drainage outflows unblocked and ditches cleared.
We are looking forward to putting together a new comprehensive SFI scheme to support our farmland habitats, integrated pest management, soil management, low input spring cropping and rotational cropping strategy. This is a greatly simplified scheme from what has been available and offers some significant payments to support what we want to achieve on the farm.
What would be the best advice you could give farmers at the moment in general?
At the moment the best advice would be for all farmers to take a good look at the new SFI scheme and take some advice on how it can really work for you. Also keep an eye out for some of our events here at Allerton which can really help too.
Saya also took a starring role in a new film recently with Schöffel, who are generously donating profits from their Black Friday sale to the Allerton Project to bolster our efforts into research on the effects of different farming methods on wildlife and the environment, education and knowledge exchange here at The Allerton Project.
