Notts farmer puts buzz into arable farming

Nottinghamshire arable farmer Gary Clarke is one of over 1000 farmers who will be establishing new legume field margins in a major new initiative to save many of the UK’s rarest bumblebee species, launched by Syngenta Crop Protection. Operation Bumblebee will replace lost flowering legume habitats on arable farms and provide bees with new vital food sources.

Mr Clarke, who farms at Lowdham, near Nottingham, reports the new legume margins are another important piece in the farm’s jigsaw of environmental features, alongside the 550 hectares of conventional arable cropping. “We already have many important environmental habitats on the farm, but the flowering legume margins plug a hole in the overall environmental package.

“We are keen to integrate environmental areas wherever possible, providing they do not impinge on the core farming activities. It is particularly important where they can help gain points for the agri-environment schemes. The flowering legume margins will maximise the benefits for biodiversity on the farm, with minimal effect on output.”

Extended habitats

Mr Clarke has been careful to pick the sites for his new margins, alongside hedges and woodland - to extend the variety of habitats available to wildlife - and to fill in the corners of fields that will make future management simpler and more efficient.

Other insects that thrive in the legume margins, including sawflies and beetles, provide valuable food sources for Grey Partridges – another Government BAP indicator species – as well as increasing the number of natural predators of crop pests, further enhancing the Integrated Crop Management (ICM) approach advocated by Mr Clarke.

Environmental Priority

“The environmental areas are being given a high priority this autumn to ensure successful establishment,” reports Mr Clarke. “We acknowledge that we will have to actively manage the margins if we are to achieve the best results - just as we would manage any crop. However, the establishment and cutting regime suggested is not too onerous and can be fitted in when convenient with other farming operations.”

The simple beauty of the Operation Bumblebee field margins is that they can be successfully created by farmers with little loss in overall field output, using existing crop establishment techniques. It is also intended that the Operation Bumblebee margins will contribute valuable points towards next year’s Entry Level qualification for arable farm support payments, as well as attracting Higher Tier premiums.

In research projects the flowering legume margins were shown to increase bumblebee and butterfly populations incredibly quickly. In Cambridgeshire, numbers of bumblebees foraging on legume margins increased by over 800% within two years, for example - including a recovery in the endangered species, Bombus ruderatus.

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