August 30, 2006

 

Twenty percent of English wheat not harvested due to rain

 

 

About 20 percent of the English wheat crop still remains to be cut as continuing wet weather has greatly hampered the collection of that grain and reduced its quality, according to a harvest report released Tuesday (Aug 29) by Grainfarmers, a UK farm cooperative.

 

Grainfarmers head of feed grains Mark Worrell said areas of unharvested wheat range from 10 percent in the South to 45 percent in Yorkshire.

 

Rain falling on ripe wheat plants, especially for extended periods of time, can greatly reduce quality and even cause sprouting in the uncut grain.

 

"Sprouting is becoming an issue, particularly on the Lincolnshire and Yorkshire Wolds," said Worrell.

 

Grainfarmers said recent samples have showed plummeting Hagberg figures, a measure of quality. "We have seen some sub-100 Hagbergs in the soft wheats," Worrell added.

 

In addition, straw strength in the plants has been reduced, which has allowed wind to knock down wheat plants in some areas and make harvesting more difficult.

 

Worrell suspects that all of the wheat still left in the field will now only be usable for animal feed. However, he said that most of the quality wheat varieties were harvested first.

 

Worrell added that because there is growing pressure to get the harvest finished, growers will start to bring in very wet grain. The wet grain will then create drying and storage problems, the Grainfarmers report said.

 

Early Tuesday, November UK feed wheat surged to a contract high of GBP87.40 a tonne, surpassing the previous mark GBP85.35/tonne set in late July.

 

Grainfarmers said strong domestic demand in the EU has helped keep prices buoyant and generate demand for UK cargoes.