Throughout the year we have been recalling the disastrous cereal harvest of 2023 in every single job we have undertaken during this campaign. Even the post we dedicated last year to the harvest was entitled "Harvesting 2023. Annus horribilis". It truly was a year of very poor yields, resulting in significant economic losses. This year, the situation has been the exact opposite, culminating in a record harvest. I don't remember a year as bad as 2023 and we don't remember a year with such high returns as we have experienced in 2024.
These days, with the cereal harvest practically finished, we are looking at the yields and we obtain a really high average for unirrigated fields: 5,800kg/ha of Medinaceli barley (all the barley we have sown is of this R2 variety). In our area, an average of 4,000kg/ha is considered very good, so this year is extraordinary One mistake we made due to last year's poor results is that we have a lot of fallow fields and we did not sow as much cereal as we could have sown.
It is true that we have done some things differently this season, specifically in sowing (using lower seed doses), in fertilisation (different types of fertiliser thanks to the slight drop in prices) and in spring with the fungicide treatment (which is not very common in barley in our area). Howevre, the main factor has been the 325 mm of rain we have had since January, which has been very well distributed over all the months of the year. I don't think we have had any long period where you can say there has been a lack of water.
Now, we are left with pulse vegetables and triticale... we will see what yields we get.
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