Offering a range of species that are beneficial as part of a rotation to improve soil structure while also utilised within environmental schemes and cover crop mixtures. Please contact us for your requirements.
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Forage Rape
This is a most useful crop and can be sown at any time from March to September providing food from Autumn to Spring.
English Giant
Broad-leaved variety and selected for its hardiness. Immense growth and a large broad leaf.
Broad Leaf Essex
More Winter hardy than English Giant and slightly shorter.
Mustard
Tilney
This variety produces high green weight matter up to flowering. Church of Bures are the sole maintainers in the UK for Tilney Mustard. It has excellent standing ability and produces large volumes of green matter and residual fibre. There is a leaflet available from us, which offers all the necessary information.
Vetch
Vetches are very important in UK agriculture. They form an essential part of any green manure mixture as their leafy plant is ideal for ploughing in to improve soil humus and structure. Arable silage mixtures also benefit from the inclusion of vetches.
English Early
It’s nitrogen-fixing properties and ability to smother weeds due to its dense foliage make this an ideal part of the organic conversion process. As a leafy and leguminous plant, it is an excellent cost-effective crop especially on organic farms.
Red Clover
Red Clover normally produces two main cuts and a small autumn cut. Most early varieties are traditionally known as Broad Red or Double Cut Clover. It is a useful component in the short-term grass mixtures for silage, haylage etc. Church of Bures are maintainers of Essex Broad and still grow the variety in Essex.
Essex Broad Leaf
It is a 100% UK native variety in which we have specialised for a number of years. Produces heavy yielding hay and seed crops. It also provides a rich quality growth and leaves excellent soil fertility.
White Clover
White clover is a low growing high tillering plant which is a very important constituent of our long-term leys. In our mixtures we blend two varieties this enables maximum benefit in terms of flexibility to most multi-purpose leys.
Church White Clover
This is a blend of medium and large leaved white clovers which will help bulk the grass for cutting and grazing with excellent mid-summer production without artificial fertilizer.
- 50% Large Leaf
- 50% Medium Leaf
Crimson Clover
Crimson Clover is a good choice for smothering weeds, fixing nitrogen and is a fast-growing bulky green manure. It has deep roots that penetrate the soil, a mass of foliage and when ploughed in helps to improve the soil structure. It will also produce lovely crimson flowers that are very attractive to bees and other beneficial insects.
Yellow Blossom Sweet Clover
Fast to establish biennial legume. Can sow from May onwards, strong rooting plant which improves soil structure.
Borage
This is a cobalt blue flowered herb, said to have been introduced into Britain by the Romans, but is now considered to be indigenous. It is a fast growing annual completing its full growing cycle in about four months. The plants are very robust and hardy and with its rapid growth rate, it tends to smother out most weeds. Borage flowers attract both wild and honeybees in very large numbers. Sown in the Spring at 6 kilos per acre and swathed in July when seed-drop is imminent, this oil crop will thrive on most soil types.
Sweetcorn
We can offer Super Sweet varieties which have a higher sugar content and slower starch conversion to give a sweeter flavour. Please contact us for availability.