FARM ZONE
An advice, comment and opinion resource for the agricultural communityA REGENCY CHRISTMAS DINNER
Those worried about overindulging during the festive season might take solace from discovering the opulence of their forbears. Bright Maize takes a look at the culinary splendours enjoyed by some in the Regency period As Christmas comes around once more, it brings...
MAIZE SEED: THE MARKET AND OPTIONS FOR 2023
When a sales advisor tells you to place your maize seed order early, you will do well to heed the advice this year. The shortage of maize seed in 2022 – not least because of the 40% yield reduction experienced last year – is real. It is true that suppliers always like...
FIVE THINGS YOU NEVER KNEW ABOUT MAIZE
It’s easy to forget what a remarkable plant maize is: a crop physically unlike any other whose history is as rich as it is surprising. This is a staple so important that it was once worshipped as a god - and yet it wouldn’t exist without human cultivation. There are...
GONZAGUE DE CARRÈRE: THE VIEW FROM MAS SEEDS
Renowned international seed company Mas Seeds has been developing and supplying maize to distributors and wholesalers for decades. But its acquisition of Bright Maize in 2018 brought with it a new challenge: selling directly to UK farmers. Gonzague de Carrère is Mas...
EDWARD GERALD STRUTT AND LORD RAYLEIGH’S FARMS
Lord Rayleigh’s Farms is known today as a successful farming and property company based on the Terling Estate, near Chelmsford, in Essex. It takes its name from the Barons Rayleigh, a title created for the Strutt family of Terling Place by George IV in 1821. The third...
BOOK REVIEW: WILLIAM SITWELL, EGGS OR ANARCHY. THE REMARKABLE STORY OF THE MAN TASKED WITH THE IMPOSSIBLE: TO FEED A NATION AT WAR (Simon & Schuster, 2016)
Feeding the nation has more or less been taken for granted in the post war years; but that premise is now being challenged as pressure mounts on production, supply chains and retail prices. We thought it would be worth revisiting by way of this review the subject of a...
MAKING THE MOST OF GRASS
Why make the most of grass...? First and foremost, it’s a lucrative resource. As Charlie Dolphin writes in the introduction to our new grass seed brochure, grass is ‘the livestock farmer’s most sustainable, cost-effective feed’. There are other reasons too - it’s very...
FOOD PRICE INFLATION SET TO CONTINUE
Food inflation hasn't been going up this quickly for over a decade - and the worst is yet to come. A flurry of recent studies furnish some statistics. Consumer group Which? found that supermarket groceries in February this year were on average 3.14% more expensive...
THE CHALLENGE FOR GRASS
Forage and grazing can determine the difference between profit and loss on livestock farms where margins are under constant pressure. With no inputs exempt from our inflationary times, Mike Sims – recently appointed to Bright Maize as grass specialist – tells us about...
BOOK REVIEW: PATRICK GALBRAITH, IN SEARCH OF ONE LAST SONG. BRITAIN’S DISAPPEARING BIRDS AND THE PEOPLE TRYING TO SAVE THEM (William Collins, 2022)
Dr Tom Adair – a writer living in France – reviews this book for Bright Maize. The contents of the book do not necessarily reflect the views of Bright Maize, its employees or others associated with the company. Why do birds matter? There are scientific - good...