If you thought mobile dryers were just for small farms, then Devon farmer Steve Lee would tell you to think again. With arable operations that cover some 750 hectares (1,850 acres) at Nethercott Farm, Chawleigh he puts almost everything through his 20-tonne capacity Opico Magna 2000 QF Automatic dryer.

Dry weather may have created cracks in the ground but this won’t have resolved areas of compaction in grassland, warns OPICO’s James Woolway. These need to be addressed by autumn subsoiling to restore drainage and allow air interchange in the grass root zone to benefit grass growth in the spring.

Mobile dryers just keep getting bigger. Opico says it will launch two huge new recirculating batch dryers at this year's UK Grain event at the East of England showground on 3 November.

Further evidence that applying fertiliser in bands in line with oilseed rape seed will boost yields has been demonstrated following analysis of crop performance data at Masstock’s SMART farm at Lincoln. Trial plots fertilised in bands using OPICO’s Ferticast produced yields 4.1% higher than plots where the granular fertiliser had been broadcast.

Lancashire farmer Richard Corlett has increased the productivity of his grassland and boosted average herd yield by 1,320 litres after just two and a half years of grassland improvement activities.

OSR growers can halve the costs of establishing a new crop simply by switching from a traditional plough-based system costing around £140/ha, to a one-pass till-seeding system which will cost between £50 and  £75/ha. Further cost-savings and/or yield boosts can also be achieved by applying fertiliser in bands at the same time as seeding using a Nitrojet liquid fertiliser applicator or a Ferticast.

After several years of trial and error, growers are successfully establishing OSR using min-till methods –– on both light and heavy land. CPM visits two growers in contrasting situations

There's more to grassland improvement than reseeding, as beef farmer in Cumbria has been finding out over the past 14 months, with help from the Grassright Group.

Opico is now offering its 2.5t front linkage and pto kits for fitting Kubota’s M128 models. The optional pto comes with an electro-hydraulic soft start clutch to prevent snatching when engaged.

OPICO has further expanded it range of tailor-made front-linkages for kubota tractors with a 1.5 ton capacity unit for the Kubota M5740 series. an eccentric pin design gives a choice of three link arm working positions, fixed, semi and fully-floating, and a vertical fold system tacks the arms clse into the tractor.

A one-pass seedbed combination created from a linking two types of powered culitivator...

At the UK Grain event, OPICO has launched its biggest mobile batch dryer yet – the new Magna 2910, with a 29t holding capacity and faster drying capability.