Farm of the Week: Five generations of family who had to change their approach after sugar beet factory closed

Former West Riding NFU chairman Robert Tesseyman succeeded Charles but sadly passed away at just 52 years of age in 2002 leaving Richard and Chris to take on the farm in their mid-20s with their mother Anne in charge of the accounts.

It is the fifth generation that is on the brothers’ minds as they look to the now not too distant future, as Richard pointed out.

“I have two sons, George who is 15 and Charlie who’s 12 and Chris has a son Max who is also 12. They’re all mad keen and we would like to steadily expand what we do. Contracting work has always been done here at Spellow Grange as our grandfather Charlie would plough and thresh for farms in addition to the home farm.

Richard and Chris said that it was the changes made to their cropping at Staveley that have shaped their farming business today. Richard said the closure of the York sugar factory was influential.

“It was very different back then, as we had another farm tenanted at Coneythorpe and we didn’t do as much contracting. We used to grow potatoes and sugar beet, but we had come out of potatoes in 2000 and then the York sugar beet factory closed in 2005. Those two things changed the business quite dramatically.

“We restructured everything gradually. It’s not all gone the right way straight away. We’ve learned a few lessons and one of those is that every farm is different, every field is different and that some things work better in certain fields than others.

“Our greater move into contracting nearly happened by accident. We just got asked to do some work on a farm some years ago and it has expanded from there.

One of the moves the brothers made in 2010 was go to down the direct drill and min-till route. Chris said that they are following in their father’s footsteps in being open to new ideas and new technologies.

“Dad liked to have the latest things, like when Massey Ferguson brought out their Datatronic tractors. He wasn’t adverse to change and neither are we.

“We do a lot of precision farming. We were early adopters of that, including variable rate spreading in the late 90s, and we went strip till and direct drill a few years after coming out of growing sugar beet.

“But that doesn’t mean we don’t offer all types of establishment through our contracting business. We provide what is needed where it is needed and so we will undertake conventional establishment with a plough and power harrow combination drill or minimum cultivation right through to true direct drilling with no cultivation.

“The reasons we went into min-till were that our soil, after growing potatoes and sugar beet, wasn’t in the healthiest of states and since we haven’t grown those we’ve been very careful with it; and the time saving that min-till brings about.

“At the time, nobody else was going into it. We were a bit younger and maybe a bit more open-minded about it. We now have two drills, a 6-metre Weaving direct drill and a 4-metre combination drill.

Spellow Grange is primarily an arable farm and this year’s cropping runs to 100 acres of winter wheat feed variety Gleam, 60 acres of winter barley hybrid variety Kingsbarn, 60 acres of oilseed rape and yet to be sown 30 acres of spring beans.

Richard said the remainder of the acreage is down to grass, game cover and stewardship.

“Our land type is a bit of everything and that can often all be in the same field. It includes sand, clay, peat and every spot in between and as such the yield can be very variable dependent on those factors and the weather.

“Our five-year crop rotation sees us as direct drill for four years and ploughing just the once in that time just in front of winter barley, which we find helps with wheat volunteers and brome control. The rotation is barley, oilseed rape, wheat, beans and wheat.

“We have 20 acres of grass from which we make silage and horse haylage for local livestock farmers and livery yards.

“We have been in countryside stewardship schemes in the past but when we looked at the new countryside stewardship scheme that came out a year or so ago it was too much of a nightmare. We are now much happier with the new Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) scheme.

The brothers’ agricultural contracting business and their contract farming arrangement with Rudding Park Estate sees them with a team of full and part-time operators that Richard said serve them well.

“We make sure we have the right kit for every job and the right people. Our team is great. They are all enthusiastic, experienced and reliable.

“We do a high volume of liquid fertiliser spraying as well as granular fertiliser spreading, we drill and combine around 2500 acres. Our only grasswork is ammonium sulphate on silage. Any grass we grow at home is baled by a local contractor.

Chris said that with their three sons all looking highly likely to follow he and Richard into the farm and contracting world they are always in the market for more contracting work and that they would particularly like to take on another contract farming operation or two.

“It’s definitely something we would like to expand in future, especially as the lads get older, as it would be something for them to get involved with, if that’s still what they want to do.

“Contract farming means that you can have a bit more control over what you do and allows you to plan a bit better. It also means that your machinery is busier and it teaches you to be a lot more efficient with both your machinery and your time.

“We contract farm 400 acres at Rudding Park Estate. They have second wheats, but no spring beans because the land doesn’t suit. This year’s wheat varieties there are Gleam and Cranium, which we’re trying this year as it is vigorous for direct drilling. The land can be loamy to wet and heavy.

Richard said they are not ones to get carried away with new shiny machinery.

“We have fabulous machinery including two New Holland combines, a fleet of New Holland and Massey Ferguson tractors and the cultivation and spraying tackle, but we don’t buy new unless we have to. We buy good secondhand stuff generally two, three or four years old and we do nearly all our own maintenance.

The next generation, George, Charlie and Max are already following in their fathers’ footsteps as they are all members of Boroughbridge YFC.

Find out more about contract farming: www.cltesseyman.co.uk