Farmers fear late harvest delays

Shropshire's harvest will be the latest for years, with scores of acres across the county ruined by weeks of torrential rain and widespread flooding.

Millions of pounds of damage has been caused as a result of the summer downpours, with crops flattened, heavy machinery stranded in soggy fields and heaters on 24 hours a day to dry the wheat.

While last week's sunshine enabled farmers to finally bring in the remainder of their harvest, they are already way behind on drilling next season's crop.

It means the financial hangover will continue into next spring, experts said today.

Shropshire agricultural consultant Bryce Rham said 95 per cent of the wheat was now in store, although there remained a big question mark over the quality.

He said: "Most farmers would rather worry about the crop being in store than worry about it still being in the ground so the fact we've had some decent weather in this last week is good news.

"The problem will rear its head in a few weeks when we start to look at the quality of the wheat. I've certainly heard on the grapevine stories of people being deducted £16 a tonne.

"That's a huge amount when you consider the price of wheat is around the £100 a tonne mark and it will cost around £125 a tonne to produce this year because of the associated costs."

Bryce said oilseed rape was three weeks late in going in as a result of the delayed harvest.

He added: "The knock-on effects for the industry can be painful. All we have to do is keep our fingers crossed for a mild October - without too much rain."

Oliver Cartwright, for the National Farmers' Union in Telford, said the weather had forced many farmers back on their heels but recent good weather had provided a much-needed boost.

"The tractors and combines were really going for it last week and over the weekend to get the remainder of the wheat crop in and a lot of what is left in the fields will be used for animal feed," he said.

"A lot of the high quality crop, for human consumption, was harvested early and has been in the barn for some time now.

"But it's still been the latest harvest for years.

"The big challenge now will be finishing the harvest and preparing the ground for next year's crops and this has also hit some delays."

By Nathan Rous