Brack Ags Back In Action

So, after a rather looooooooooong summer of farming - haymaking, chicken husbandry and orchard cultivation & maintenance, we are back at brack!!! Slightly different timetable structure, and some key farming topics removed including advanced workshop and dairy! Our college days remain as Wednesday, Thursdays and Fridays and week one has gone as follows:-

Wed
Root Crops & Field Vegetable Production
An introduction to roots, legumes, brassicas, other... Legumes consist of peas and beans; Brassicas consist of brussel sprouts, cabbage and cauliflowers; Root Crops consist of carrots, parsnips, onions, beetroot and turnips and Other agriculture crops include asparagus, leek, celery, lettuce, rhubarb and watercress.

Farm Habitat Management
An introduction to the history of agriculture incorporating legal developments, mechanisation, crop variety, animal husbandry, wars, farming systems and social influences. We started to look at the early stages of agriculture from Neolithic (5000BC to 3000BC) to the Bronze Age (2500BC to 800BC) to Iron Age farming (800BC to 100AD). Very interesting lesson.

Farm Walk/Visit
This afternoon we visited a local crop and vegetable farm - Carr Banks Farm, Farnsfield. Primarily growers of carrots, potatoes and parsnips, we were given a tour of the different vegetable fields and had a look at some of the cultivation and harvesting equipment specific to root crops with lots of information from manager Lawrence about each veg, how it grows, when harvested and end product destination.

Thur
Business Management In Land Based Sector
An introduction to what it takes to hold a managerial position within the agricultural industry.

Business Planning In Land Based Sector
An introduction to the business planning and accounting requirements for managerial positions within the agricultural industry.

Estate Skills
An introduction to estate skills and how these practices are used within farming practices. Our first task will be to build a simple brick wall structure, so we practiced working out a right angle using the 3:4:5 principle (where the measure of 5 from corner to corner is the exact distance between the corners of 3 and 4).

Fri 
Beef Husbandry
A recap on the different beef producing systems - Cereal, Silage, Maize, 18 months and 24 months and a look at the different animals used within the systems including native and continental bred animals.

Learner Support Session
A visit from Sue Sutton who will work with the class over the coming weeks to improve maths and English skills for better use within the agricultural industry.

Combinable Crops
No teacher - so free time to start one of the five assignments already handed out!!!

Investigative Project
An introduction to our investigative project that we will be required to work on during this year.

... its tiring being back!!!!!!