The Roundup Guide to ELS Management

July 2006 - A quick guide to the practicalities and pitfalls of the key Entry Level Stewardship options for English agronomists, produced with specialist advice from the Rural Development Service (RDS) and working agronomists across the country.

Entry Level Stewardship clearly has something for almost everyone, with most arable options capable of generating a positive return for most growers alongside worthwhile improvements in environmental quality and diversity.

At the same time, however, individual options need to be chosen and implemented with great care and flexibility if they are to deliver the required benefits at the least cost.

The key thing that must be appreciated about Entry Level Stewardship is that it involves a five-year commitment to follow specific rules which can cut down the farm's room for manoeuvre in adapting to problems or changes. Set out in detail in the ELS Handbook, these rules are a binding part of the legal agreement.

Under these circumstances it is wise to build as much agronomic as well as rotational freedom as possible into this commitment by selecting a good mix of different options.

This will be especially important in keeping on top of weeds like brome, black-grass and ryegrass which almost certainly pose the biggest agronomic threat from ELS, given its particular restrictions on herbicide use.

Assessing The Arable Options

Rotational options such as Overwintered Stubbles (EF6), Conservation Headlands (EF9) and Skylark Plots (EF8) that can be moved around the farm from year to year offer the greatest agronomic flexibility. Not least because they all enable at least one annual dose of Roundup to tackle weeds.

Wild Bird Seed Mixtures (EF3) which can be periodically relocated within the same field and Pollen & Nectar Flower Mixtures (EF4) which must stay in the same location but may be re-established if necessary also give some valuable weed control flexibility.

In contrast, Field Corners (EF1), 2, 4 and 6-metre Buffer Strips (EE1, 2 & 3) and Beetle Banks (EF7) offer the least flexibility. They have to be maintained through the full five-year term, with only spot herbicide treatment or weed wiping allowed to control injurious or invasive alien weeds.

This means they should not be placed on land with known weed problems or without doing everything possible to minimise the weed threat before and during establishment.

Management Plan Options

Alongside Hedge & Ditch Management (EB1, 2 & 3 and EB 6 & 7), Buffer Strips and the main options for arable land, most growers going into Entry Level Stewardship are looking to earning a block of their points from Management Plans.

While it appears attractive to earn nine of the 30 points needed per hectare without any agronomic change by producing Soil, Nutrient, Manure and Crop Protection Management Plans (EM 1, 2, 3 & 4) it is essential to understand and follow the Handbook rules carefully.

For instance, points can be earned across all a farm's hectares (apart from unimproved land) with a Soil Management Plan, but assessments of run-off or erosion risk have to be conducted for every field. And they must be reviewed every year.

Nutrient Management Plans need to be drawn-up annually too. They also have to be done on a field-by-field, crop-by-crop basis to an agreed process in conjunction with a FACTS-qualified person.

Organisational Essentials

All in all, it is essential growers go into ELS with their eyes open, claim only what is reasonable and fair; and, above all, obey the rules.

Otherwise, RPA inspectors can and will recalculate points totals which may take the farm below its required target, leading to a forfeit of payments.

Once everything is signed and sealed, tractor drivers and contractors should be provided with copies of a farm plan showing the locations of all the options and advice on what they entail. This is the best way of avoiding unfortunate errors like badly-rutted buffer margins which are sure signs of non-compliance.