Hear Pulse Pioneer, Rob Waterston’s, bean story…
Achieving consistency with his bean crops is the main goal for NCS project trials carried out by Rob Waterston.
He has been manager for Welford Park Estate near Newbury since 2007. Overseeing approximately 1068ha of farmland, Rob has evolved practices to focus on sustainability.. This has included a move away from high input production and a focus on soil health and plant nutrition, reduced fertiliser use and adopting practices including cover cropping, companion cropping, strip tilling and direct drilling.
Including beans in the seven-year rotation is a key part of this new approach, however the crop is not without challenge, he says. “We’ve been growing winter beans for several years. I think we’ve had two successful years, when they’ve done really well, and we’ve had some shockers as well.
“So that’s the challenge for me. I see them as a good thing from a sustainability point of view, but the inconsistency drives me mad.”
In the first year of the project (2023-4) Rob’s trial was a 3ha block of beans from which he took leaf samples to send away for analysis.
“On the back of that we tailor made a nutritional programme,” he explains. “We did that twice in the build up towards flowering to make sure the plant gets everything it needs to maximise the flowering potential. It was quite an expansive list of micronutrients that went on.”
He achieved a 0.2t yield uplift in that area and a wealth of benchmark data from ADAS Bean YEN, into which his crop was entered, to analyse and interpret its performance.
Being a Pulse Pioneer involves quite extensive sampling. “There is some work to it, but you only get out what you put in. I am always bit last minute with the samples,” he admits. “There is always something else to do but it is worthwhile.” The resulting ADAS reports include a vast amount of data and there is support available to help the Pulse Pioneers to interpret it.
Now in year two, the field previously under beans has been planted with cereals to assess the impact of the pulses on the subsequent crop. While it is assumed that the next crop will benefit from residual nitrogen in the soil left by the beans, the Pulse Pioneer trials set out of quantify the difference it makes.
“The wheat crop that follows our beans always looks good, so they must be leaving some nitrogen in the soil, but how much?”
Rob joined the project after three successful years as an AHDB Monitor Farm. His experience engaging with other farmers and other experts and sharing knowledge was extremely positive and he particularly enjoyed hosting visits on the farm. Joining the NCS project seemed like a logical next step and he particularly values the opportunity to collaborate and share learning with other farmers growing beans.
All Pulse Pioneers have also been asked to take a carbon footprint calculation of their farm through Farm Carbon Toolkit, something with Rob had done previously as a Monitor Farmer too. It’s an extensive process but worth it, he says. “It’s a bit daunting at first but it’s useful as it focuses your mind about everything you do.
“The main contributor to our carbon emissions is nitrogen, and pulses obviously help with that no end.”
Off the back of his carbon baselining Rob has signed up to a carbon platform, Rob continues. “Agreena issue certificates to us once we’ve been audited and thoroughly validated. We then decide who we would like to sell them to and when.
“We are mindful of our carbon footprint and are trying to reduce our nitrogen requirements but it’s tough. Getting agriculture to Net Zero without farmers forgoing nitrogen is an enormous challenge – peas and beans will be a valuable part of the jigsaw, but farming without nitrogen at present would be impossible.”
For the owners of the Welford Park Estate legacy is important, adds Rob. “In 2012 we decided to change things up. We planted hedges and trees, created wildflower meadows, and we are producing food as well. I’d like to think we are doing our bit for the environment.
“Our system has changed. We’re no longer relying on chemicals – we’ve not used any insecticides for four years and not seeing any detriment to that.
“We’ve got a long way to go, but the farm is in better health than it was 10 years ago.”
He believes that beans will play an important part in ongoing improvements and is keen to continue growing them. “With the Sustainable Farming Incentive, it would be quite easy to not grow beans, or any other break crops. The safer bet would probably be to go down the legume fallow route and just take the money.
“But we still need to grow food in this country. And there’s no denying that beans are a great break crop, but unfortunately there are some years where they don’t return a profit.”