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United Kingdom - Introducing LG Legends grower, Ryan McCormack, Farm Manager at Dennington Hall Farms based in Suffolk
United Kingdom
Ryan McCormack is the Farm Manager at Dennington Hall Farms based in Suffolk. Dennington Hall Farms is a 1,600ha combinable crops and sugar beet operation. Since joining the business in May 2022, Ryan has developed a diverse cropping rotation, set a new machinery strategy to suit a regenerative approach and is creating a forward-thinking team culture. With a key focus on soil, air and water health, Ryan now operates a 12-year cropping rotation, integrating grazing livestock across arable land, moving to variable rate liquid fertiliser, reduced tillage and a block of Wildfarmed Bi-cropping. Ryan is BASIS and FACTS qualified and has a continued passion for data, innovation and technology. He achieved silver in the British Farming Awards, ‘Arable Innovation’ award in 2019 and is a member of the 68th Worshipful Company of Farmers. Ryan completed his Advanced Business Management Course in 2018. Introduction Dennington Hall Farms is a family-run 1,600-ha heavy land farm in east Suffolk, that has recently transitioned to a regenerative farming system as part of its ongoing commitment to sustainability and responsible land stewardship. There is a particular focus on building the health of the predominantly heavy clay soils, promoting biodiversity, and sequestering carbon, through a range of techniques, including; reduced tillage, cover and catch crops, a diverse 12-year rotation, and managed grazing. Cropping includes; winter wheat (mainly Group 4s for local feed markets), oats, spring barley, winter barley, sugar beet, vining peas, beans, mustard, oilseed rape, plus Wildfarmed bi-crops, cover and catch crops. Livestock – sheep from a neighbouring farm – are also integrated to graze cover crops. How many different varieties are grown and how long would you grow a variety for? This season, the farm is growing around 15 different varieties across all crops, plus several blends. Varieties include:
Farm manager Ryan McCormack says a variety is usually grown for three or four years (assuming no disasters in year one), before deciding whether to replace it with something else. “That decision depends how strongly it has performed; there’s no real timescale for how long we’ll keep any variety for. Generally, we’ve got four or five mainstream varieties, and every year we look at what’s new, what’s going to work for us, and then replace the weakest of those main varieties.” Sometimes a new variety may be trialled on a small 30-40ha area first if there are potential question marks over how it might perform, but he may also commit a whole 100ha block if confident in its potential – as was the case with LG Beowulf and LG Typhoon this season. What characteristics are most important to you when choosing a variety? While yield is important, Mr McCormack’s aim is to select varieties that also have good agronomics and characteristics to suit the specific requirements of different parts of the varied rotation. “After sugar beet, for example, we’re looking for something that gets up and away quickly, and has high vigour, even if sown late into sub-optimal conditions, which is where LG Redwald fits in. “On other parts of the rotation, we’re looking at lowering our inputs and reducing cultivations, so that’s why LG Typhoon was chosen, as it can be direct drilled, knowing that we’ll get a good plant stand – it has that agronomic advantage over some other varieties.” Have these characteristics, or weight of importance, changed over recent years? The farm’s approach to variety selection has evolved with the move to regenerative farming, Mr McCormack says, with greater focus now given to finding the agronomic characteristics that suit specific situations, to improve yield security. “Traditionally the farm would have been more intensively cultivated, drilled early, looking primarily for high yields, and not necessarily focused on agronomics, gross margin, or soil health when looking at varieties. “But in recent years, we’ve been focusing much more on gross margin and the other aspects that varieties can bring to the party, not necessarily just looking for ‘barn fillers’. Yield is still important, but it’s about finding varieties that also have good agronomics that suit our soils and the situations we’re putting them in.” Why have you chosen LG varieties? This season, Dennington Hall Farms is growing 100ha blocks of three Limagrain varieties, LG Typhoon, LG Beowulf, and LG Redwald. LG Typhoon was chosen primarily for its suitability to wider-row regen-type systems, says Mr McCormack. “We wanted a variety we could scratch in, or direct drill after legumes, and LG Typhoon seems to be the choice for regenerative farming, given it can go into a very min-till, or direct-drill situation and produce a good plant stand. Agronomically it’s very pleasing and has good yield potential. “It has definitely got different characteristics to other varieties; it spreads and stays quite flat to the ground over winter, which is good for wider rows, or direct drilling scenarios, where you want a developed canopy to smother any grassweeds before stems start extending.” He also values LG Typhoon’s suitability for earlier drilling. “We’re not drilling really early, but typically look to start in the first week of October with LG Typhoon, and aim to finish by the end of October.” LG Redwald, grown for the first time in 2023/24, was chosen for its vigour when being sown later in the autumn after sugar beet. “LG Redwald is known for being very vigorous, and might seem a risky choice for highly fertile, heavy soils, but if it’s being drilled late into a sub-standard seedbed after sugar beet, you want that extra vigour to grow away and still yield well.” Another new addition this season is LG Beowulf, grown as a first-wheat after oilseed rape. “I saw it twice in trials last year and for me, it was the stand-out variety for its agronomics, yield potential, and vigour,” says Mr McCormack. “I’d describe it as the ‘heavy land LG Redwald’. “LG Beowulf is clean, high yielding, and has good vigour, but suits our fertile, heavy soils. It’s everything we want from a variety right now.” LG Redwald also features in a three-way blend alongside Champion and Dawsum, which is being trialled to see if mixing genetics and agronomics can help reduce disease pressure, improve plant stand, and maximise yield. The farm is heavily into conservation, so avoids using insecticides wherever possible, therefore having Orange Wheat Blossom Midge resistance in all three Limagrain varieties helps in that respect, Mr McCormack notes. How are the varieties performing to date and have you managed them differently this season? At the time of writing, approaching the T2 timing in mid-May, Mr McCormack says the 100-ha of LG Beowulf after oilseed rape looks the strongest of the wheats. “It looked well all winter and early spring, although the lack of rain is a concern for all crops. Coming into spring, it looked like a 12 t/ha crop of wheat, but if I had to put a figure on yield now, I’d say it’d be nearer 11 t/ha, which is still very good. That might reduce to 10 t/ha if we don’t get any rain in the next three weeks though.” Mr McCormack says a different establishment approach was tried on some fields of LG Beowulf this season, whereby a summer catch crop went in after the OSR harvest, which was mob grazed with a neighbour’s sheep, before direct drilling LG Beowulf on 27/28 October. “That’s later than most people would drill first-wheat after oilseed rape, but it was a good opportunity to bring a catch crop and livestock into the rotation. It also improved soil resilience to a spell of heavy rain in mid-October.” Given the dry spring, the LG Beowulf has only received liquid fertiliser, while other varieties have had a 50:50 split of granular and liquid fertiliser. Disease pressure has been relatively low across all varieties, with no real issues seen thus far, other than odd incidences of rust and Septoria, Mr McCormack says. As a result, he has been able to reduce fungicide spending at the T0 and T1 timings, adjusting both product choices and rates to risk and yield potential. The later-sown LG Redwald has so far received the lowest fungicide input, reflecting the fact that yield potential has been compromised by an estimated 1-1.5 t/ha due to late sowing after beet, and a very dry spring, he says. The more open canopy also means ground has dried out slightly more than in the other LG wheats where larger canopies have provided more of a shading effect, he notes. While fungicide inputs have been reduced overall, this has been supported with additional micronutrients, such as manganese and magnesium, to build plant health and natural disease resilience. Mr McCormack says LG Typhoon has stayed true to its characteristics, remaining close to the ground in early spring, before a dramatic change in late April/early May as growth started to extend upwards. “Now it’s looking good, and more vigorous. If I had to put a yield on it at this stage, I’d say it’s on the ‘good’ spectrum, at around 10 t/ha, providing we get some much-needed rain in the next few weeks.” The blend trial looks well, although he admits the dry conditions have not really tested the aims of the trial. “We haven’t had the disease pressure, nor have we been increasing fertiliser due to massive yield potential, so it’s hard to judge performance. Crops look well from the field edge, but once you get into them, you often find they haven’t put huge amounts of biomass on.” Finally, if a breeder gave you three wishes for varietal traits what would they be? One key trait would be to have mainstream wheat varieties with resistance to barley/cereal yellow dwarf viruses (BYDV), to remove the need for using any insecticides in the autumn, says Mr McCormack. Ergot is another issue that can be “a bit hit and miss”, so removing that through varietal breeding would be beneficial, he says. Another is gout fly resistance, as that seems to be becoming an increasing issue, he adds. “Finally, if I were to fast forward 20 years, we’d be looking to grow varieties that allow us to be fully self-sufficient, so we’re not having to buy in lots of fertiliser and we can supply the nutrients required.” More news from: Limagrain UK Ltd. Website: http://www.limagrain.co.uk Published: May 28, 2025 |
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