Elveden Estate's stop-start harvest as rain slows progress

Rain has hampered progress as farmers bring in the barley crop - and that's before starting in on wheat. The carrot, potato and onion harvest has also been hit by weather-related hold-ups.

For Andrew Blenkiron, who now heads up the estate's wide-ranging operations as managing director, it has been a busy start - but he's loving it.

Andrew Blenkiron (Image: Denise Bradley) He took up post in April having previously directed operations at the neighbouring Euston Estate. He oversees a team of about 200 - including the business's hospitality and retail operations. The property portfolio includes 250 homes, estate-owned businesses and a number of commercial lets.

Among his team are senior farms manager Nick Scantlebury and forestry and conservation senior manager Rob Minty.

The estate's large vegetable and cereal fields are bounded by lines of protective pine trees - some about 100 to 120 years old - which have been twisted out of shape by decades of relentless wind. Mini-tornados are a common sight across the flat, light land.

Rob Minty, forestry and conservation senior manager at Elveden Farms, at the estate's heathland (Image: Denise Bradley) The farm lies in the heart of the Brecks - an ancient heathland spanning nearly 400 square miles of Norfolk and Suffolk - and is home to a rich abundance of wild flora - including blue-flowering Breckland plant Veronica Verna - and fauna.

These include stone and common curlews. Two estate workers are employed specifically to help maintain this fragile outpost for these rare birds - part of a monitoring effort which began 26 years ago.

The 22,500-acre estate is home to 18 pairs of stone curlews and nine pairs of common curlews and its heathland is managed to support and maintain the population in this beautiful oasis of calm close to the busy A11 trunk road.

Nick Scantlebury, senior farms manager at Elveden Farms, in a carrot field with the linear irrigator. (Image: Denise Bradley) Loud fighter jets on practice flights from one of two RAF bases which flank the site periodically break the silence.

Elveden is a member of the Breckland Farmers' Wildlife Network which aims to enhance and improve the ecology of the area on a landscape scale. As well as participating in this, it commits to various community projects - including instating a permissive pathway from Little Eriswell to Eriswell village.

Many farmers have been tested by this season's extreme weather - but an exceedingly wet spring followed by a periodically showery summer have meant that until this week Elveden's giant linear irrigators - measuring 450m -  have not been in action on its vast 24ha carrot field.

Andrew Blenkiron, managing director of the Elveden Estate, in one of the potato fields (Image: Denise Bradley) This was planted just six weeks ago for harvesting in mid-October and is progressing well.

"We have had 70mm of rain in the first three weeks of July. The long term average is 52mm for the whole month," explains Nick.

"The amount of rainfall we have had is very helpful and we have not had any extreme temperatures but the season is later because we have had less sunshine."

The vegetable crops are looking "very promising", he says but he adds: "For all it has been a good season for us it has not been good for everyone else."

In the wider UK, the extreme wet conditions have caused headaches for many farmers - not least upsetting seed drilling schedules and prompting difficult last-minute decisions to ditch certain crops.

At Elveden, they measured 125mm of rain in February 2024 compared to just 23mm in February 2023.

Carrots grown on the estate (Image: Denise Bradley)

Less irrigation represents a key saving for the Elveden Farms business - the most important of various income streams on the estate. It operates 26 linear irrigators and a further 46 rain guns. Six people are involved in the irrigation operation alone.

To date this year it has used about half its water reserves - a lot of it during a three-week dry and warm period in June.

Some crops have already been harvested - salad potatoes started under fleece in January went to the early market.

Red onions grown on the estate (Image: Denise Bradley) The estate contract-grows potatoes for McCains and these have been topped to stop them growing further while preserving them ready for harvest later. The onion crop will also be late because of the lack of sunshine which has held up growth.

Rain has made it a stop-start harvest for other crops such as barley, which is being grown for Crisp's Malt, and is currently looking on track to be average-yielding. "It's been frustrating," admits Andrew. "In the last five days we have been rained off twice."

The weather has also led to some brackling - or buckling - of the crop but it's too early to say what effect this will have on yield.

A wild flower verge on the Elveden Estate (Image: Denise Bradley) "Our yields are looking relatively constant. We are not going to have a bumper harvest because of the lack of sunlight - but I'm relatively pleased so far that it has been constant," says Nick.

The extreme weather also has an effect on the estate's many trees. The pines have been a feature for 120 years and the estate is now looking at how to replace those which are dying.

Rob is worried about the effect of the weather extremes on avenues of lime trees and other trees on the estate. These were extremely stressed by the summer heatwave a couple of years ago. Wind and torrential rain could now adversely affect them in their weakened state.

Among a number of other factors, Andrew must grapple with many environmental constraints on the estate.

"We have got to jump through so many hoops - it's costly and very frustrating," he admits.

Elveden Farms' linear irrigator (Image: Denise Bradley)

He hopes the incoming new government may help to drain some of this bureaucratic morass and enable the developments he feels are needed to keep the estate viable.

Andrew believes that there are important practical improvements which could be carried out on the estate without upsetting its environmental ends - including small-scale solar arrays to power some of the estate's boreholes and a new workshop.

His biggest challenge is the sustainability of the farming business - and vegetable cropping which is heavily reliant on access to water.

"We have just got planning permission for  third reservoir," he says. "It's almost doubling our capacity in winter storage which is so important on this incredibly light land."

The loss of the Basic Payment Scheme (BPS) farm subsidy is a big blow to all farm businesses - and farmers are trying to make this up from other payment schemes.

"If they have recovered more than 50% of the total payments they had I would say they have done incredibly well out of the schemes," says Andrew.

One avenue is to try to make up the gap from the market place. Elveden is beginning to do this with one conservation scheme now in place as mitigation for a house builder for a development scheme.

As far as the future of businesses like his goes, it's "vital" that the UK consumer continues to support British-grown produce, he says. But his industry is facing inflationary costs of about 4 or 5% - which is above the current 2% rate of household inflation.

"Some of these planning issues are vitally important to us so we can continue to develop our business," he says

But with all its challenges, Andrew is greatly enjoying his new post.

"I love it. It's a great team of people," he says. "It's great being still involved with Breckland farming - and having the same contacts and the same people to deal with is important."