:00:07. > :00:14.Across the country the race is on to bring in our food. It's Harvest
:00:14. > :00:18.time! Gathering in the bounty of the land, is the most crucial event in
:00:18. > :00:22.the countryside calendar And now, as this year's harvest reaches its
:00:22. > :00:26.climax. It's time to see exactly what's happening with all our crops.
:00:26. > :00:35.Seeds of life to sustain us. Fresh vegetables pulled from the earth.
:00:35. > :00:40.Fruit that's our sweet treat. All conjured up from Mother Nature.
:00:40. > :00:44.We'll be discovering the remarkable craft, and magic of farming. And
:00:44. > :00:49.finding out just where our food comes from. No matter how clever
:00:49. > :00:53.farming becomes, our crops are still at the mercy of the weather.
:00:53. > :00:57.Harvest 2012 was a disaster. After record summer rainfall, crops failed
:00:57. > :01:05.and prices spiralled. Can 2013 put our farmers back on
:01:05. > :01:11.track to deliver the food we all rely on? As the harvest comes in we
:01:11. > :01:23.will reveal the results. This time we're looking at our
:01:23. > :01:26.cereals, the seeds of life. This is wheat, and it feeds the world. But
:01:26. > :01:55.have our farmers grown enough for us? Welcome to Harvest 2013!
:01:55. > :02:01.We are in the last flush of summer. Harvest is happening all around. I'm
:02:01. > :02:05.Gregg Wallace, greengrocer by trade. This is by far my favourite season
:02:05. > :02:11.of the year. No better time to explore the business behind getting
:02:11. > :02:14.great food on our plates. I'm Philippa Forrester. I'm particularly
:02:14. > :02:19.interested in the quality of our food that we buy. But also because
:02:19. > :02:30.I've grown my own for so many years, I'm fascinated by how these guys do
:02:30. > :02:34.it on such a massive scale. We're here at a classic arable farm in
:02:34. > :02:37.Essex. For a year we've been following the wheat crop from
:02:37. > :02:40.planting right through to harvest. And right now we're going to see
:02:40. > :02:44.what it takes to bring in these crucial grains - to give us our
:02:44. > :02:50.daily bread. We'll also find out about other valuable cereal crops
:02:50. > :02:53.across the country. Rapeseed is famous for its striking yellow
:02:53. > :02:58.flowers. But what are the secrets of its tiny dark seeds? How are golden
:02:58. > :03:05.fields of barley and their precious grains turned into whisky? And food
:03:05. > :03:13.expert Stefan Gates will unpack the science behind how our crops are
:03:14. > :03:15.grown. Out there somewhere is our farmer working nonstop to get his
:03:15. > :03:26.crop in. Let's go and meet Tom. On days when the sun's shining
:03:27. > :03:30.there's no better place to be, and I never struggle to find the
:03:30. > :03:33.motivation to get out of bed Tom Bradshaw took a bold decision when
:03:33. > :03:36.he started to run the family farm. He gambled its future, selling the
:03:36. > :03:43.livestock to risk everything on growing crops. You just can't
:03:43. > :03:47.imagine, if somebody had said 20 years ago this what we'd be doing
:03:47. > :03:49.now there's not a chance I'd have believed them. To secure the
:03:49. > :03:54.family's future, Tom turned to growing wheat and mixed grains.
:03:54. > :04:01.Success rested on the quality of their soil, so Tom dug deep into the
:04:01. > :04:04.science. I applied for a scholarship, and got the opportunity
:04:04. > :04:08.to research what was happening in our soils and then I went off around
:04:08. > :04:16.the world and saw hundreds of different farmers, and learnt a huge
:04:16. > :04:19.amount. Everything we eat comes from the soil. Without a really healthy,
:04:19. > :04:23.living soil system, then we can't produce the food that we rely on to
:04:23. > :04:27.survive. It is the centre of life on earth. We want to be the people in
:04:27. > :04:30.the area that are recognised for doing the job better than anyone
:04:30. > :04:34.else. Everyone is sort of buzzing around the start of harvest and
:04:34. > :04:36.we're really looking forward to the hard work and the results from the
:04:36. > :04:45.previous year. Well, Tom, we appreciate that this
:04:45. > :04:51.is absolutely your most busy time, the wheat harvest. So thank you very
:04:51. > :04:57.much for having us here, cluttering up your farm. How's it going? Well,
:04:57. > :05:00.we're in the beginning of the harvest here on this farm and we're
:05:00. > :05:04.waiting to see what the quality and what the quantity is like. So it's
:05:04. > :05:08.really early days because we can look at the grain and it looks OK,
:05:08. > :05:12.but until we have it tested we don't know what it's going to be used for.
:05:12. > :05:16.If it doesn't meet the grade and it's not high enough protein, then
:05:16. > :05:20.actually what ends up is this goes to chickens or pigs, and it's worth
:05:20. > :05:25.a lot less as animal feed than it is as bread wheat. Oh! We didn't have a
:05:25. > :05:28.very good spring did we, we had a really cold spring, we had a
:05:28. > :05:32.disastrous last year. I mean, if you think back to the spring of last
:05:32. > :05:35.year we had the wettest year on record. And it was just awful. But
:05:35. > :05:38.more importantly than that we didn't have any sunshine, and crops just
:05:38. > :05:41.cannot grow without sunshine. But it means that this harvest is actually
:05:41. > :05:45.really important. This harvest is critical for many farmers, because
:05:45. > :05:48.large parts of the country had a terrible time last year and then
:05:48. > :05:51.we've had a really challenging autumn, some farmers are desperately
:05:51. > :05:56.trying to keep their foot in the door and what we need to know now is
:05:56. > :06:00.A, what the yields are, B, what the quality is and C, what the prices
:06:00. > :06:03.are. Are we going to have wheat good enough here to bake some really good
:06:03. > :06:07.bread? Let's hope so.So this harvest is all about wheat. But how
:06:07. > :06:10.did wheat become so fundamental to our diet? Meet the wheat. Some
:06:10. > :06:12.10,000 years ago wild strains of this grass, cultivated in the Middle
:06:12. > :06:16.East, gave birth to farming. Hidden this grass, cultivated in the Middle
:06:16. > :06:18.in the wheat-head are the tiny grains we eat. They contain a rich
:06:18. > :06:22.core of protein and carbohydrate - the energy store to grow a new
:06:22. > :06:26.plant. Now it's the staple food for over a third of the human race.
:06:26. > :06:33.Wheat covers more of the earth's surface than any other crop. Britain
:06:33. > :06:40.has an excellent climate for growing wheat. The south of England was once
:06:40. > :06:44.a breadbasket for the Roman Empire. In 1981, Britain set the world
:06:44. > :06:50.record for wheat yield from a single field. Will harvest 2013 break the
:06:50. > :06:54.current record, now held by New Zealand?
:06:54. > :07:01.I love that, the story of wheat and the story of western civilization so
:07:01. > :07:04.closely entwined. And my new friends at Rothamstead Research, look what
:07:04. > :07:11.they've given us. 10,000 years of wheat history. And that wheat
:07:11. > :07:15.history, well, that's our history. And the one that fascinates me the
:07:15. > :07:17.most is this one here, at the point when we stopped being hunter
:07:17. > :07:22.gatherers and we started being farmers. This is what we would have
:07:22. > :07:24.grown. And when we started to grow our own foods like this, well,
:07:24. > :07:31.Western civilization, it just blossomed. Wild wheat plants still
:07:31. > :07:33.grow today in the Middle East. Using their seeds, and cultivated wheat
:07:33. > :07:39.preserved for hundreds of years, the scientists at Rothamsted have grown
:07:39. > :07:42.this amazing timeline. Over thousands of years our ancestors
:07:42. > :07:48.selected bigger wheat plants with more, and fatter grains. But by the
:07:48. > :07:53.1950s we had reached the limit. The wheat heads were so heavy they were
:07:53. > :07:58.easily flattened by wind and rain. Farmers now needed plants with
:07:58. > :08:04.shorter, stronger stems. Modern wheat, little short stems, and nice
:08:04. > :08:07.big fat juicy heads. But that plant there, bears very little resemblance
:08:07. > :08:15.to the one we started off with 10,000 years ago. I like to think of
:08:15. > :08:18.the Romans, growing wheat here in Essex as they did 2,000 years ago,
:08:18. > :08:22.and the problems that they faced back then are very similar to the
:08:22. > :08:26.problems our Tom faces now. Now he should have been planting out last
:08:26. > :08:35.autumn but the weather back then was terrible. Let's see how he got on.
:08:35. > :08:40.The wettest summer for a century had left wheat fields looking like
:08:40. > :08:45.swimming pools. By early October, Tom still hadn't sown any of his
:08:46. > :08:51.wheat crop. But a rare break in the weather gave him the opportunity
:08:51. > :08:55.he'd been desperately waiting for. So we start off with a little wheat
:08:55. > :08:58.seed here. This sort of reddy colour because they've all had fungicide
:08:58. > :09:02.applied to them. So this tries to keep the plant in healthy condition
:09:02. > :09:06.right the way from day one. On the back of the tractor here we've got
:09:06. > :09:09.our seed drill. We've got the main hopper here which holds about a
:09:09. > :09:13.tonne of seed. So we drop the seed into the top of the hopper, the
:09:13. > :09:17.seeds are then blown down these pipes here and as it comes down
:09:17. > :09:21.these pipes, the tyne at the front here makes a groove and the seed is
:09:21. > :09:23.then dropped down in the trench behind the tyne
:09:23. > :09:26.then dropped down in the trench we've got a levelling harrow which
:09:26. > :09:29.just levels everything off and just makes sure that the seed is all
:09:29. > :09:31.buried. This is one of most important days in the crop's life.
:09:31. > :09:34.If this goes wrong at this stage important days in the crop's life.
:09:35. > :09:37.then really there's nothing we can do for the rest of the season.
:09:37. > :09:40.Making the most of the decent do for the rest of the season.
:09:40. > :09:44.weather, and with the success of his 2013 harvest at stake, Tom started
:09:44. > :09:56.his seeds on the beginning of their remarkable journey. Stefan Gates has
:09:56. > :10:03.been exploring the nature of these little embryonic marvels.
:10:03. > :10:07.Seeds are nature's way of ensuring that plants survive into the next
:10:08. > :10:14.generation. But what exactly is a seed?
:10:14. > :10:19.Seeds come in lots of different shapes and sizes, but within every
:10:19. > :10:30.single one of them, new life has already been created. This is a
:10:30. > :10:34.broad bean pod. If I Open it up, you find these. Now these beans are all
:10:34. > :10:35.actually little seeds. If I cut Open the protective coating and take a
:10:35. > :10:44.look inside... This little bit up here is the
:10:44. > :10:50.embryo: it contains all the genetic information the seed needs to become
:10:50. > :10:53.an adult plant. All the rest of the bean is the endosperm, it's a
:10:53. > :10:58.package of energy to support it on the first stage of its journey.
:10:58. > :11:03.Given a very precise combination of the right temperature, and enough
:11:03. > :11:09.water, the seed will germinate and the plant start to push up in search
:11:09. > :11:15.of sunlight. Each bean contains about one calorie: the energy it
:11:15. > :11:18.requires to reach the surface. Under optimum conditions, it can grow at a
:11:18. > :11:26.staggering rate of three centimetres a day. It's the energy in the seeds
:11:26. > :11:30.that we're after - in wheat it's stored as carbohydrate. Dark brown
:11:30. > :11:33.rapeseeds contain edible oil, and that's their energy store,
:11:33. > :11:43.concentrated inside a tiny package, even smaller than wheat. Take a
:11:43. > :11:47.handful of seeds to a desert island, and you should be able to feed
:11:47. > :11:50.yourself forever more. Because all that's needed to start growing
:11:50. > :11:52.something this tiny, into something this huge, is water, warmth, and
:11:52. > :12:04.sunlight. By the end of November last year,
:12:04. > :12:07.the seeds Tom had sown five weeks ago were just beginning to emerge.
:12:07. > :12:11.But with the awful weather he still hadn't managed to plant enough wheat
:12:11. > :12:18.for his harvest. By the big freeze in January this year, he was
:12:18. > :12:23.seriously worried. We've had tonnes of rain falling on this field.
:12:23. > :12:26.People think about millimetres and inches, but every raindrop that's
:12:26. > :12:30.fallen on this field, over the size we've got here is tonnes of rain. As
:12:30. > :12:34.they fall on the ground, every raindrop gradually pounded it down
:12:34. > :12:38.and we end up with the soil being compacted. These fields are
:12:38. > :12:41.saturated, they're really wet. The only reason we're able to plough at
:12:41. > :12:43.the moment is because it's been really cold, minus eight, minus nine
:12:43. > :12:46.the moment is because it's been last night and it means that the
:12:47. > :12:50.frost in the surface can take the weight of the machinery. Without
:12:50. > :12:54.that we wouldn't be able to move, and as soon as the frost lifts we're
:12:54. > :12:58.not going to be able to do anything, so thankfully while the frost is
:12:58. > :13:02.here we're able to get some work done. Ploughing might seem like good
:13:02. > :13:05.news, but not for Tom. Usually he injects his seeds directly into the
:13:05. > :13:09.soil, without the need to plough at all. He treats his soil as a living
:13:09. > :13:15.ecosystem, full of worms and helpful bacteria, but he had to plough them
:13:15. > :13:19.up. It was the only way to get air back into the compacted sodden soil
:13:19. > :13:25.and give him a chance to get the rest of his wheat seeds planted. We
:13:25. > :13:28.haven't ploughed in this field for eight years and it was a really
:13:28. > :13:32.tough decision. It's something that goes against our morals and the way
:13:32. > :13:35.we're trying to head. We've been working with nature, trying to build
:13:35. > :13:38.up the organic matters, encouraging the earth worms and trying to get
:13:38. > :13:43.everything working for us and suddenly you come in here now and
:13:43. > :13:56.undo a lot of good work very quickly. But it's just what we had
:13:56. > :13:59.to do to try and salvage something. I can kind of understand you being
:13:59. > :14:03.passionate about soil as a gardener and we're told all different ways of
:14:03. > :14:07.managing it, you know, one minute you're meant to dig deep, the next
:14:07. > :14:10.minute you're not meant to dig at all. But I never really thought
:14:10. > :14:14.about it in relation to farming. I mean the soil for us in fundamental
:14:14. > :14:16.to everything we produce. It is absolutely at the core of what we're
:14:16. > :14:19.doing and unless we look after it absolutely at the core of what we're
:14:20. > :14:23.and treat it as a special habitat that it is, we can't expect to
:14:23. > :14:26.produce the best crops. It's an organic thing, isn't it? This is
:14:26. > :14:30.alive, it's full of bugs. There's billions of bacteria in here and we
:14:30. > :14:34.need to let them thrive, and feed them and make sure they've got the
:14:34. > :14:38.correct nutrition, just like you and I need to eat. The soil needs
:14:38. > :14:41.feeding as well and if we look after this, then everything above it looks
:14:41. > :14:43.after itself. It saves us having to put a lot of the artificial
:14:43. > :14:46.fertilisers on because they're all put a lot of the artificial
:14:46. > :14:50.contained in here. So how do you manage your soil that's different
:14:50. > :14:53.from the way most farmers might do? We treat every area of this field
:14:53. > :14:58.separately. So we have it all zoned so if we go onto the map here you
:14:58. > :15:00.can see that on the map is all these different colours around the field
:15:00. > :15:02.can see that on the map is all these and that's because every area that's
:15:02. > :15:06.a different colour needs managing differently because when we test it
:15:06. > :15:09.it's got specific things that need managing separately to the other
:15:09. > :15:13.areas in the field. So some areas I can see are rich in some minerals
:15:13. > :15:16.and some areas are more acid than alkaline, and you're managing each
:15:16. > :15:20.field, and each area of each field for that. Exactly that. As we drive
:15:20. > :15:22.across the field, every area is given specific applications to
:15:22. > :15:26.across the field, every area is that area up to the rest of the
:15:26. > :15:29.field. So you really do take it to an extreme We have to, cause that's
:15:29. > :15:33.how we unlock the potential in these fields. Tom's wheat fields are
:15:33. > :15:36.golden now, but to get here it's been a constant battle with the
:15:36. > :15:39.elements. He'd ploughed his fields in January to plant the remaining
:15:39. > :15:42.wheat, but by April things still weren't looking good. So we're
:15:42. > :15:45.wondering what's happening in this field which has been planted for
:15:45. > :15:48.five weeks and I think it's all down to the soil temperature. We'd
:15:48. > :15:52.normally expect there to be 2-3 inches of growth by now. Here we can
:15:52. > :15:56.see that it's below two degrees which is seven degrees lower than we
:15:56. > :16:00.would normal expect at this time of year and explains why things have
:16:00. > :16:04.been very, very slow to grow. If you plant into cold soils, it means that
:16:04. > :16:08.things are going to be very slow to germinate and very slow to take off.
:16:08. > :16:12.Once we start digging you can just begin to see the shoots which have
:16:12. > :16:16.come up from the seeds and are just about to break the surface. Now when
:16:16. > :16:19.it does warm up, hopefully it will grow very quickly and within a few
:16:19. > :16:22.weeks it should be a lovely lush green field After an exceptionally
:16:22. > :16:26.chilly start to the spring, green shoots of hope finally started to
:16:26. > :16:29.appear, but they were much later than usual. And now the next threat
:16:29. > :16:32.emerged. The shoots now are vulnerable to pest attack, I mean
:16:32. > :16:36.rabbits, hares, geese. They can all come in and graze the crop off. But
:16:36. > :16:39.because the soils now warmed up, they're beginning to grow really
:16:39. > :16:42.quickly and actually they'll rapidly grow from underneath it. Probably
:16:42. > :16:45.the biggest threat to this crop conditions turning dry. Because
:16:45. > :16:48.there's no root structure then it's really susceptible to having a
:16:48. > :16:52.problem with dry conditions in May and June. So Tom was pinning his
:16:52. > :16:54.hopes on a wet spell during the summer.
:16:54. > :17:00.Right now, Tom's harvest is in full swing, and it won't be long before
:17:00. > :17:06.he finally learns how his crop has done. But there's no time to take
:17:06. > :17:09.stock. He might be in the middle of harvesting his wheat, but the
:17:09. > :17:13.weather also provides a golden opportunity to start sowing his oil
:17:13. > :17:17.seed rape for next year's harvest. While the sun shines, and his fields
:17:17. > :17:23.are dry, he can plant it straight into the wheat stubble without the
:17:23. > :17:27.need to plough. These little beauties here, these are rape seeds,
:17:27. > :17:30.aren't they? That's what rape crop grows up from. The yellow flowers in
:17:30. > :17:34.the spring, all come from that. Forgive me but are they supposed to
:17:34. > :17:37.be bright purple? No, when we harvest them they're black but
:17:37. > :17:41.that's just a treatment to stop the insects and stuff eating the crop so
:17:41. > :17:44.we don't have to spray anything on it. Forgive me, Tom, but you haven't
:17:44. > :17:46.even finished harvesting the wheat yet and you're thinking about
:17:46. > :17:48.even finished harvesting the wheat another harvest for next year.
:17:48. > :17:51.even finished harvesting the wheat mean, it's all about logistics and
:17:51. > :17:54.the more we can get done at this time of year the better the
:17:54. > :17:58.prospects are for next year. Is that right? And that is your dad working
:17:58. > :18:03.on there is that right? It is, yeah. Did you flip a coin as to who was
:18:03. > :18:07.going to drive the tractor and who was going to talk to me? Nah, he
:18:07. > :18:10.prefers to be on the tractor and out of the limelight. You probably don't
:18:10. > :18:13.recognise the seeds, but you definitely would recognise the crop
:18:13. > :18:16.- it's what turns our fields that bright beautiful yellow. In spring
:18:16. > :18:20.our countryside is transformed by a sunburst of yellow. Oil seed rape in
:18:20. > :18:23.bloom. British production of this relative of the cabbage, has doubled
:18:23. > :18:30.in the past ten years. And it's all because of a rich secret at the
:18:30. > :18:34.heart of its flowers. If we pull the petals off, we've got that green
:18:34. > :18:38.pod, and if we cut one open we can see inside what we'll be harvesting
:18:38. > :18:42.later on in the year. Once we come to harvest, the white seeds will be
:18:42. > :18:45.black. The pods will be two and a half inches long. And there'll
:18:45. > :18:48.probably be 40 or 50 seeds inside each of the pods. And it's these
:18:48. > :18:51.precious black seeds we're after. They're packed full of oil and
:18:51. > :18:58.protein, which is used to make bio-diesel, animal feed, and a
:18:58. > :19:01.wonderful golden cooking oil. You're planting rape seed right now, which
:19:01. > :19:05.is a product that I really, really like. How did it perform for you
:19:05. > :19:08.this year? It was a pretty challenging year for us with the
:19:08. > :19:11.rape seed. We've only ended up actually harvesting about a third of
:19:11. > :19:15.what we drilled last year just because of the challenges we've
:19:15. > :19:19.faced with the really wet autumn, cold winter and spring, and so a lot
:19:19. > :19:23.of the rape seed actually failed. What we've harvested's been OK but
:19:23. > :19:26.we pulled a lot up and drilled it with oats and different crops. So
:19:26. > :19:30.what you got up was all right, but how much did you say you lost? About
:19:30. > :19:34.2/3rd of the crop. You're kidding me? I mean I know it's early days
:19:34. > :19:38.now and you've only just planted it out, but when will you see some
:19:38. > :19:42.life? When will it germinate? Erm? we'll look for that in about a
:19:42. > :19:45.fortnight's time. This time of year soils are really warm, there's a lot
:19:45. > :19:49.of moisture there. Great conditions now to be planting rape seed in. So
:19:49. > :19:52.you are feeling a bit more positive? This is perfect conditions at the
:19:52. > :19:56.moment, we're really pleased. And rape seed oil is a tricky plant, I
:19:56. > :20:00.mean, as soon as it's ready it's got to be harvested and you've already
:20:00. > :20:04.done yours here in Essex. So we went up to Scotland where they harvest
:20:04. > :20:07.theirs a week or so later. At his farm in the Tweed Valley, Colin
:20:07. > :20:11.McGregor is preparing to harvest his crop of oil seed rape. I'm the third
:20:11. > :20:21.generation on this farm. Family came here in 1927, 86 years ago. This is
:20:21. > :20:25.my 25th harvest. We're used to seeing our fields of oil seed rape
:20:25. > :20:30.awash with colour. But to get at the seeds within the pods, the plants
:20:30. > :20:34.have to be dried out. We spray the crop with a dessicant and that kills
:20:34. > :20:38.the green area on the crop, cos if the crop's green it's very difficult
:20:38. > :20:46.to harvest. It takes around three weeks for the rapeseed to dry out.
:20:46. > :20:50.If the rapeseed is too wet, it will clog up the combines. Too dry, and
:20:50. > :20:54.the seeds will scatter in the fields. So Colin needs to test the
:20:54. > :21:00.moisture content. When it's dry enough, the reading should be close
:21:00. > :21:06.to 10%. We've got a reading of 12.7%. So another couple of hours,
:21:06. > :21:08.get a breeze, bit of sunshine up, combines'll be ready and we'll give
:21:08. > :21:23.it a go. Yeah, we'll come and get a sample in
:21:23. > :21:25.a minute. If Adam and Harry are listening let's access it through
:21:26. > :21:29.the bottlenecks of the pond. With such a short window of opportunity,
:21:29. > :21:32.Colin must run his harvest like a military operation. And that means
:21:32. > :21:37.co-ordinating all three combines at once.
:21:37. > :21:57.There's a thousand acres to get through, but the team can clear over
:21:57. > :22:01.ten acres an hour. I love the pressure of being busy and when it
:22:01. > :22:06.all stops in a few weeks' time, then I'm sort of wondering what to do.
:22:06. > :22:10.And there you are - the finished article, rape seed oil. And I am a
:22:10. > :22:16.huge fan. From this lovely black stuff, to that. And I tell you why
:22:16. > :22:19.I'm a massive fan and I know you use it. It's because it's a local
:22:19. > :22:22.product and it's actually healthier than olive oil, it's got much less
:22:23. > :22:26.saturated fat AND it fries at a really high temperature. So those
:22:26. > :22:30.people who like fried food, like me, and the rest of Great Britain, this
:22:30. > :22:32.is healthier to fry with and it's local and I love it. So I've used it
:22:32. > :22:36.for cooking, but I've never, I mean local and I love it. So I've used it
:22:36. > :22:38.this is cold pressed isn't it. This is cold pressed, this is the finest
:22:38. > :22:42.stuff. You can cook is cold pressed, this is the finest
:22:42. > :22:45.you can also use this for salad dressings. I've never done anything
:22:45. > :22:48.like that. Can you see the different colours, look at the different
:22:48. > :22:50.variation in colours Is that like olive oil when you've got a
:22:50. > :22:53.variation in colours Is that like taste and a milder taste? No. No,
:22:53. > :22:57.no, no. But they will taste different but that's just because of
:22:57. > :23:00.where they're grown, not just because of the colour? That's right.
:23:00. > :23:03.OK That's absolutely right. See I've never tasted it like this before.
:23:03. > :23:07.You've always used it for cooking? Yeah. Do you want to start with the
:23:07. > :23:10.light one? And tell me what you taste. Light, I do taste light.It's
:23:10. > :23:14.very light. Not much flavour. Doesn't feel oily. Maybe it's a
:23:14. > :23:17.little floral? Try this one, because they darkness doesn't make it
:23:17. > :23:24.stronger, it makes it different. That's really nice! Yeah, I get nuts
:23:24. > :23:31.there. That's completely different again. And a little bits of citrus.
:23:31. > :23:35.And we know that this is a really important crop for farmers like Tom.
:23:35. > :23:37.But for Tom at the minute, the wheat is taking all his time and
:23:37. > :23:44.concentration, because harvesting that wheat is a round the clock
:23:44. > :23:48.operation. After last year's wash-out, Tom's making the most of
:23:48. > :23:50.every dry moment - when the sun shines,and when it doesn't.
:23:50. > :23:55.With the weather being so good right now, they're harvesting night and
:23:55. > :23:58.day, but what will the wheat quality be like? That worry's been keeping
:23:58. > :24:27.Tom awake since the start of summer. This year's run of good weather is
:24:27. > :24:30.making harvesting easier for Tom, but the quality of what he's
:24:30. > :24:38.bringing in was shaped several months ago.
:24:38. > :24:48.Back in early June, Tom's wheat was still green. It was a crucial time
:24:48. > :24:54.for the plants' health. So I paid a visit. So, this is what it's all
:24:54. > :24:57.about. These are the wheat seeds forming, growing, and these are what
:24:57. > :25:02.Tom is hoping to harvest in about two months time. But in order for
:25:02. > :25:06.this plant to plump out these seeds, it needs to be healthy. And Tom
:25:06. > :25:09.needs 1000s and 1000s and 1000s of them.
:25:09. > :25:23.Eric Ober has been working with cereal crops for 27 years. He's
:25:23. > :25:28.something of a wheat doctor. First up, the Beam Fractionator and its
:25:28. > :25:37.sci-fi companion. This is the other half of it. The Lightsabre, yes! So
:25:37. > :25:41.what do I do with this then, Jedi Master? If you put that on the soil
:25:42. > :25:45.underneath the canopy and that will be measuring how much light is
:25:45. > :25:48.managing to get through the canopy. So what's the result? 95% of the
:25:48. > :25:56.light is being intercepted, so that's good.
:25:56. > :26:01.Two months before Harvest, Tom was relieved his wheat was soaking up so
:26:01. > :26:12.much sun. But what exactly does a plant do with sunlight? Stefan Gates
:26:12. > :26:16.has been exploring. In order to grow, all plants have to pull off
:26:16. > :26:27.the same incredible trick: they transfer sunlight, water and Carbon
:26:27. > :26:29.Dioxide gas into solid matter. This amazing growth process, known as
:26:29. > :26:34.Photosynthesis, is powered by the energy in sunlight. During
:26:34. > :26:38.photosynthesis, plants absorb carbon dioxide, but they release oxygen,
:26:38. > :26:42.the oxygen we all rely on to breathe.
:26:42. > :26:48.Normally it's invisible. However, there is a way in which we can see
:26:48. > :26:50.photosynthesis actually happening. All it takes is a lamp and some
:26:50. > :26:56.aquatic plants. If you look underwater,
:26:56. > :27:01.photosynthesis is happening right now. Light enters the green
:27:01. > :27:07.chlorophyll in plant cells where it reacts with carbon dioxide and
:27:07. > :27:12.water, to make sugar. The waste product is oxygen which is being
:27:12. > :27:15.released as these tiny bubbles. If I move the light further away, the
:27:15. > :27:27.bubbles slow down. Move it closer, the bubbles speed up.
:27:27. > :27:31.Using photosynthesis, crops convert the sun's energy into energy stored
:27:31. > :27:37.in their grains, and that's the food energy we harvest.
:27:37. > :27:45.So farmers say they're 'harvesting sunlight'. But be careful what you
:27:45. > :27:47.wish for - too much sun and not enough rain and crops won't have
:27:47. > :27:49.sufficient water for good growth. enough rain and crops won't have
:27:49. > :27:58.It's all in the balance. So back in June, was Tom's wheat
:27:58. > :28:01.getting a healthy balance of sun and water? A thermal imaging camera
:28:01. > :28:14.showed hotspots in the crop. There's a lot of crop that's blue,
:28:14. > :28:17.that that means the canopy is cool and there's plenty of moisture
:28:17. > :28:20.moving through the crop. But there's also spots in the field that are a
:28:20. > :28:24.lot warmer. And that suggests that the roots aren't able to get enough
:28:24. > :28:28.moisture. Red signalled danger for Tom's harvest. His wheat could be
:28:28. > :28:33.too dry for the grains to fill out. The plants needed water. If the dry
:28:33. > :28:40.summer continued, they'd be at the mercy of how much moisture was left
:28:40. > :28:45.in the soil. So now you've dug it up, what can you see? You just get
:28:45. > :28:48.so much chance to see what's happening with the roots, and that's
:28:48. > :28:52.what we're really worried about, it's trying to see what's happening
:28:52. > :28:56.inside here. We can see that we've probably got ten inches of soil, 12
:28:56. > :28:58.inches of soil, and the roots are growing through the bottom of it.
:28:58. > :29:02.They've been able to access the moisture and the nutrients. But it
:29:02. > :29:06.was still two months to harvest, and a crucial time when the wheat grains
:29:06. > :29:09.had to fill out. We need plenty of sunshine through June and July but
:29:09. > :29:14.we're also going to need moisture. We can see that there's not a lot of
:29:14. > :29:17.moisture left in this soil. And we want to keep everyone happy, so sun
:29:17. > :29:21.during the day, rainfall at night, and it could be a bumper harvest.
:29:21. > :29:25.After an awful start to the year, Tom was finally optimistic his crop
:29:25. > :29:28.might come good. All he needed was a typical British summer, with plenty
:29:28. > :29:32.of rain. But a few weeks later, in mid July, we were basking in the
:29:32. > :29:35.longest heatwave this century. Was it too much sun, too early in the
:29:35. > :29:48.season, for our wheat farmers? Tom was anxious for rain. Yesterday we
:29:48. > :29:53.went over 30 degrees, it was the hottest day of the year. We've had
:29:53. > :29:57.plenty of sunshine but we haven't had enough moisture and the crops in
:29:57. > :30:03.the field are now really beginning to struggle. It's just too hot for
:30:03. > :30:06.the plant. The plant on the left was taken from some really good soil
:30:07. > :30:10.that can store moisture. This one on the right was taken from the gravel
:30:10. > :30:14.soils where it's not able to store the same amount of moisture. And you
:30:14. > :30:17.can see the colour difference, with these being a sort of light green,
:30:17. > :30:21.strawy colour compared to the dark green colour on this side. So these
:30:21. > :30:25.ones which are visibly still green have still got lots of moisture
:30:25. > :30:29.inside them, and as we squeeze them you should be able to see lots of
:30:29. > :30:40.moisture and they're sort of only at a milky ripe stage. This is from the
:30:40. > :30:44.area of the field which is dying down, where the lack of moisture and
:30:44. > :30:48.the extreme heat from the sun is causing it to die early. And you can
:30:48. > :30:52.just see as we squeeze it, generally there's a lot less moisture. We
:30:52. > :30:54.refer to this one as dying off because it's prematurely ripening,
:30:54. > :30:58.whereas this one is still thriving and still able to photosynthesise
:30:58. > :31:00.through the green leaves. So we're seeing the yields curtailed by this
:31:00. > :31:03.through the green leaves. So we're real heat and dry weather, and it's
:31:03. > :31:05.all down to not having enough rainfall. So it's going to be having
:31:05. > :31:11.all down to not having enough a major, major impact nationwide.
:31:11. > :31:18.Now with the combines rolling, Tom's starting to see the results of all
:31:18. > :31:21.his hard work. But there is one wheat crop that remains uncut. He's
:31:21. > :31:31.hoping this special field will produce premium quality grain that
:31:31. > :31:35.will all go to make bread. If it doesn't make the grade, it will only
:31:35. > :31:38.be good for animal feed. You had another very late night, working
:31:38. > :31:43.well into the night with those combines. That's what we thrive on
:31:43. > :31:47.at this time of the year! Absolutely. And we still don't know
:31:47. > :31:49.how good that harvest is yet. But this is your special field isn't it?
:31:49. > :31:51.This is one of the ones that we this is your special field isn't it?
:31:52. > :31:54.think is one of the best fields on this is your special field isn't it?
:31:54. > :31:57.the farm this year. this is your special field isn't it?
:31:57. > :32:01.high hopes for it and today we're going to find out how good it is.
:32:01. > :32:05.Why is this field so special? This is the one that we've been treating
:32:05. > :32:08.especially all year. It's looked a great field of wheat, we're really
:32:08. > :32:12.hopeful it's going to me one of the highest yielding bits of wheat. So
:32:12. > :32:15.we're now going to find out, does it make milling quality, what's the
:32:15. > :32:19.yield and just how successful it's been. Is this your bread field? This
:32:19. > :32:21.is the bread field, exactly that. So we're hoping to be making some bread
:32:21. > :32:25.is the bread field, exactly that. So out of this later. But how do you
:32:25. > :32:29.know that it's ready to harvest? The first thing we have to do is we have
:32:29. > :32:32.to make sure the moisture content is where we need it for harvesting. We
:32:32. > :32:36.to make sure the moisture content is need it to be below 15% and what
:32:36. > :32:40.we've got here, we just need to be able to run some grains out so that
:32:40. > :32:58.we can mill them down. And then just put it into the moisture meter which
:32:58. > :33:01.is just like a coffee grinder. It's only now, after nearly a year of
:33:01. > :33:05.worry, that Tom will finally discover the quality of his crop.
:33:06. > :33:08.What impact has the heat wave had on his special field? So, Tom, that
:33:08. > :33:12.lack of rain, that lack of moisture, what's that going to do to the crop?
:33:12. > :33:16.We're almost about to harvest. It just means the ears, the grains
:33:16. > :33:18.aren't going to be as big as they could have been and I'm sure we've
:33:18. > :33:21.lost some yield from not having could have been and I'm sure we've
:33:21. > :33:24.enough moisture. OK, well, we're about to find out. Well if you're
:33:24. > :33:28.going to harvest you're going to need one of these! Look at that
:33:28. > :33:32.beastie. It is a mega machine. The scale of it's amazing. I'm scared to
:33:32. > :33:35.ask. What's the cost for one of these babies? You're looking at
:33:35. > :33:39.around a quarter of a million pound investment. It's huge. It is. But
:33:39. > :33:42.you have to think, in the field we're about to harvest there's
:33:42. > :33:46.probably over £50,000 worth of produce that we're harvesting. So
:33:46. > :33:49.they bring in a massive value in a day as well. So big investment but
:33:49. > :33:51.hopefully a lot to harvest. But then what's interesting is that you're
:33:52. > :33:55.replacing hundreds of workers. I mean in the olden days the whole
:33:55. > :33:58.community used to get involved, didn't they? The whole village was
:33:58. > :34:01.involved with harvest and that's where the harvest festival came
:34:01. > :34:05.from. So we went to meet a good friend of Tom's actually, Guy Smith,
:34:05. > :34:09.who does hanker after those good old days a bit. Farming was once a
:34:09. > :34:10.labour intensive business but in the last hundred years around one
:34:10. > :34:13.million jobs have been lost. last hundred years around one
:34:13. > :34:16.there's a farmer who wants to celebrate the effort of those lost
:34:16. > :34:20.workers. In August we visited Guy Smith who offered to help us re-live
:34:20. > :34:27.the people powered harvest of the past. So this was the workforce that
:34:27. > :34:30.your dad had on the farm? How many people were there and how does that
:34:30. > :34:35.compare to your workforce now? Well, when Dad took over the farm in 53,
:34:35. > :34:39.the year he got married, he had 60 blokes and 40 horses and today I've
:34:39. > :34:45.got two blokes and three tractors. That's a big change. In one
:34:45. > :34:49.generation? Yeah. I've seen a lot of changes in my time and he saw a lot
:34:49. > :34:53.of changes in his time. In those days they weren't doing all the
:34:53. > :34:56.harvest by hand but you can see they've got the pitch forks and
:34:56. > :35:00.that's what they were shifting the bales and the straw with. You
:35:00. > :35:04.actually personally feel a real link into the past, don't you? I do. When
:35:04. > :35:12.I see my dad there with all his blokes, yeah. You all right?When
:35:12. > :35:16.you're a farmer's son of a farmer's son of a farmer's son you recognise
:35:16. > :35:19.that in farming there's a sort of thread of continuity in your life
:35:19. > :35:22.that goes back through many years. The landscape, the crops you grow.
:35:22. > :35:26.You know you should be proud of where you come from, be proud of
:35:26. > :35:28.your roots. Be aware of the past, be aware of tradition. To celebrate
:35:28. > :35:31.your roots. Be aware of the past, be this long farming tradition, Guy
:35:31. > :35:33.wants to experience the harvest of yesteryear. He's put together an old
:35:33. > :35:40.wants to experience the harvest of style reaping gang. Champion scyther
:35:40. > :35:46.Simon Damant knows how it was done. Use the point to get it up so you're
:35:46. > :35:55.getting bigger handfuls. Like that? No, like this.
:35:55. > :36:04.A reaper could do 12 of these in a day. A day would be ten hours. While
:36:04. > :36:08.they begin their toil, on the other side of the field, I'm keen to see
:36:08. > :36:11.how these teams were made redundant by the combines. Not surprisingly
:36:11. > :36:17.how these teams were made redundant I'm going to need a safety lesson
:36:17. > :36:24.before I get to drive it. I'm under the strict supervision of Nigel
:36:24. > :36:32.Honeyman. Everything will come to life. Including the telly?Including
:36:32. > :36:35.both tellies. We have one telly looking behind us and one telling us
:36:35. > :36:38.everything we need to know about what's happening with the combine.
:36:38. > :36:42.Most of our controls are on this orange handle here. So this deals
:36:42. > :36:45.with motion, it deals with moving the cutter bar up and down. So how
:36:45. > :36:49.is it cutting so fast? We have 25 the cutter bar up and down. So how
:36:49. > :36:55.foot knife sections along the front. That's cutting at approximately 1300
:36:55. > :36:59.cuts per minute. The hardest bit about this is having to stay bent
:36:59. > :37:05.double. Apart from that? Not hard work, he says. He's been doing it
:37:05. > :37:30.for about 15 seconds! So what's the average speed of a
:37:30. > :37:34.good farmer? Well we've done a quarter of a football field already.
:37:34. > :37:37.We've already done a quarter of a football field? While Gregg and Guy
:37:37. > :37:40.are getting blisters hand reaping, I haven't even got my hands on the
:37:40. > :37:41.wheel. We're being steered from space. GPS satellites know exactly
:37:41. > :37:56.where we are. At full power we can cut a tonne of
:37:56. > :38:02.wheat a minute. But the real beauty of a combine is that it combines the
:38:02. > :38:04.job of cutting with threshing. The chaff spews out and the grain is
:38:04. > :38:16.collected behind the cab. When do I chaff spews out and the grain is
:38:16. > :38:20.need to slow down then? You got to double tap the yard button as soon
:38:20. > :38:24.as the last of the standing wheat is done. Tell me when, tell me when,
:38:24. > :38:34.tell me when. Now! That's it, you can stop now. Ah yes, look at that,
:38:34. > :38:39.and even better look at this. This is what we've just harvested in a
:38:39. > :38:43.couple of minutes. You'd have to really go some to do that by hand.
:38:43. > :38:49.For the lads it's painfully slow progress. But they do have some
:38:49. > :38:57.stalks for threshing. Time to bring in reinforcements.
:38:57. > :39:03.Back in the day women and children were a vital part of the wheat
:39:03. > :39:09.harvest Once you've cut it you've got to separate the ear from the
:39:09. > :39:15.stem. That's what these guys are attempting to do. After it's been
:39:15. > :39:21.threshed, the wheat still needs winnowing before the grain is ready.
:39:21. > :39:24.And winnowing is literally separating the wheat from the chaff,
:39:25. > :39:31.so what we're doing is trying to get the husks off the grain. If I do a
:39:31. > :39:35.bit of this you can see that the wind takes the husk and I'm just
:39:35. > :39:45.left with the grains from the middle. It's all in the angle of the
:39:45. > :39:50.tipping. There's enough to make a small bap. How much toast have we
:39:50. > :39:55.got in here do you think? I'd say two pieces. I'd reckon you're lucky
:39:55. > :39:57.to have crust. 30 of us have been harvesting for two hours. Do we have
:39:57. > :40:03.to have crust. 30 of us have been enough wheat to feed ourselves? So
:40:03. > :40:09.come on, what have we got? And we have just under ten kilos. So how
:40:09. > :40:14.many loaves of bread would that make? Well, you take one kilo of
:40:14. > :40:18.wheat to make one loaf of bread, so we've got just enough to make ten
:40:18. > :40:28.loaves of bread. Guy and his team have learnt the hard way the effort
:40:28. > :40:31.involved in the harvest of old. Back here on Tom's farm, I'm with combine
:40:31. > :40:37.operator Olly bringing in the wheat that we hope will make the grade for
:40:37. > :40:42.bread flour. Gregg's over there in the tractor, ready to collect our
:40:42. > :40:48.first load of grain. Now if you let go of the steering wheel. Now? What
:40:49. > :40:53.now? And then if I double click that button. That's it, that's going in
:40:53. > :40:58.now. Then press your RES button and that will lower your header down. I
:40:58. > :41:02.still can't get used to no steering. At the end of the day, when you
:41:02. > :41:05.don't have to steer, you can really get the performance out of the
:41:05. > :41:08.machine. So can you make a difference to what's coming in?
:41:09. > :41:12.Yeah, yeah, on the sample and how clean it is and your losses. What
:41:13. > :41:16.you're blowing out the back So there's an awful lot more to think
:41:16. > :41:20.about than just me sitting here and driving it? Oh, definitely.In the
:41:20. > :41:24.thinner patches you can push on a bit more. Obviously you have to keep
:41:24. > :41:27.the combine loaded and then when you get to the thicker areas you need to
:41:27. > :41:31.slow down because obviously you'll be putting a lot more through the
:41:31. > :41:34.machine. It's not just about being a driver. It's about being an
:41:34. > :41:37.operator. That is a nice sight to see, all that grain pouring in.
:41:37. > :41:41.Yeah, it definitely is a good feeling. That's great. And what have
:41:41. > :41:45.we got in terms of how we know how much our yield is, what we're
:41:45. > :41:48.getting out? If you press run number two, you've got your yield there. So
:41:48. > :42:01.right now we are harvesting? Actually it's going up. 8.3, 8.7
:42:01. > :42:05.tonnes per hectare. Yeah, that's the average of the field so far. And
:42:05. > :42:07.what would be a really good yield? It would be nice to be averaging ten
:42:07. > :42:11.but obviously because of the weather It would be nice to be averaging ten
:42:11. > :42:15.this year it's not going to be anywhere near like that. OK. And
:42:15. > :42:17.would you expect it to vary, the yield throughout the field?
:42:17. > :42:20.would you expect it to vary, the because of the different soil types
:42:20. > :42:23.and structures over the field. I find this fascinating, you know.
:42:23. > :42:27.Tom's maps and how you can map out each field and tailor what you're
:42:27. > :42:31.doing to the crop. To the pinpoint, exactly. Oh, a hare! Look at that!
:42:31. > :42:34.It's great, isn't it? It's such a treat for us to get a hare. You just
:42:34. > :42:38.don't see them. Beautiful. Well, it's bumpier than I thought it was
:42:38. > :42:41.going to be. We're going right across the rough stuff at the
:42:41. > :42:45.moment. It's just because it was so wet last year. Normally you wouldn't
:42:45. > :42:48.have those ruts. It's just because it was so wet. Tom, this is
:42:48. > :42:56.Philippa. We were thinking that we'd unload here. That's exactly what we
:42:56. > :43:00.thought. Great minds. So let me get this right. You've got to get beside
:43:00. > :43:04.the combine harvester and he's going to empty some of what he's picked up
:43:04. > :43:08.into your truck? That is it. We try and keep him going all the time.
:43:08. > :43:12.When we have both combines and all our carting gang we're looking at
:43:12. > :43:16.£400 an hour running cost. So if you're half an hour behind on this,
:43:16. > :43:20.that's £200, simple as that? The plan is that he doesn't stop. That's
:43:20. > :43:21.it. Now you can let go of them. If you slow down. Tom's coming up
:43:21. > :43:25.behind us and it's you slow down. Tom's coming up
:43:25. > :43:28.idea to unload. OK, standing by to unload. Say when. As soon as he's
:43:28. > :43:31.underneath there. He's in position, so press unload and out it
:43:31. > :43:33.underneath there. He's in position, spew? Tom, try and drive in a
:43:33. > :43:37.straight line. This will be embarrassing if I get this wrong,
:43:37. > :43:43.won't it? Right, we're unloading, here we go. I've pressed it, here it
:43:43. > :43:52.comes. Look at that! There it is. That's extraordinary. That is
:43:53. > :43:55.fantastic. That is fantastic. I know you probably take that for granted
:43:55. > :43:59.fantastic. That is fantastic. I know now but that is wonderful. It takes
:43:59. > :44:05.it out really fast, doesn't it? That comes out at about 150L per second.
:44:05. > :44:08.It's got to be deeply satisfying. At the end of all your hard work for
:44:08. > :44:12.the year, watching that. Yeah, definitely. That's the year complete
:44:12. > :44:17.now, when that's back in the shed. I get that. It's a good feeling Oh,
:44:17. > :44:25.he's stopped. Is that enough? Have we emptied him? That was fantastic.
:44:25. > :44:28.That was fantastic. Will one tractor like this going backwards and
:44:28. > :44:32.forwards keep that whole harvester going? Will we need two? We have two
:44:32. > :44:35.harvesters and three tractors and trailers. And sometimes we need a
:44:35. > :44:37.fourth tractor and trailer. When the machines are working together,
:44:38. > :44:43.logistics are much easier. When they're working apart, it's really
:44:43. > :44:49.difficult. Let's get this lot back to the grain store.
:44:49. > :44:57.You get to play with some very big toys, don't you, mate? You know
:44:58. > :45:01.what? Boys and their toys and all that sort of thing. Tonker toys.
:45:01. > :45:02.Well done, Tom, very skillfully done. I'm proud of you, mate. That's
:45:03. > :45:06.another 18 tonnes safely put in the done. I'm proud of you, mate. That's
:45:06. > :45:10.grain store. And what I'm most excited about is that we've sent a
:45:10. > :45:18.little bit to the flour mill so we can make some bread later. Now
:45:18. > :45:21.that's a good sight, isn't it? Does that give you a real sense of
:45:21. > :45:31.satisfaction? Suddenly you know it's safe once you've got it in the barn.
:45:31. > :45:34.This is what we work for, the whole year is spent trying to get this.
:45:34. > :45:39.Forgive me, a city boy like me, I mean I know I like my food, but I'm
:45:39. > :45:43.ignorant. I mean you can't just plant it out and leave it, can you?
:45:43. > :45:47.No. It takes a lot of nurturing through the year. I mean, we plant
:45:47. > :45:50.seeds in the autumn, but then right the way through from the spring
:45:50. > :45:53.we're in the field every three or four weeks doing different things to
:45:53. > :45:58.it. So we're putting treatments on it or fertiliser to make it grow to
:45:58. > :46:01.try and get the crop to be as good as it can be. What do you put on the
:46:01. > :46:04.try and get the crop to be as good crops, Tom? Everybody wants to know.
:46:04. > :46:06.We're putting on just basic plant food - nitrogen, phosphate and
:46:06. > :46:09.We're putting on just basic plant potassium. Just simple minerals that
:46:09. > :46:12.they need to grow. But then also sprays to make sure they don't get
:46:12. > :46:14.any diseases. It's just simple things to keep them healthy. People
:46:14. > :46:15.any diseases. It's just simple are scared of sprays and stuff,
:46:15. > :46:19.aren't they? It's a are scared of sprays and stuff,
:46:19. > :46:22.subject but we can't feed the world organically. So yields would be half
:46:22. > :46:25.what they are if we weren't using the chemicals and fertilizers that
:46:25. > :46:29.we're using at the moment. It's not possible for the world to feed
:46:29. > :46:32.itself on organic wheat? I don't believe it is. However it's grown,
:46:32. > :46:33.there's always a huge demand for wheat. The poorer quality grains go
:46:34. > :46:36.for animal feed but wheat. The poorer quality grains go
:46:36. > :46:38.that his will be sold at a wheat. The poorer quality grains go
:46:38. > :46:42.to a mill like this and go to make wheat. The poorer quality grains go
:46:42. > :46:45.bread. Grain analyst Jo Cauvain is here to test Tom's wheat and let him
:46:45. > :46:54.know whether his special field has made the grade. And do you have to
:46:54. > :46:58.do this with every batch? Every lorry load that goes into a mill,
:46:58. > :47:03.every lorry load that has to go onto a ship. And what do you have to do
:47:03. > :47:05.to it? First I turn it into flour, and then we'll test the thickness of
:47:05. > :47:13.the actual dough. I'm going to weigh out seven grams.
:47:13. > :47:19.And here I've got 25ml of distilled water. Then I combine the two. So
:47:19. > :47:24.this is basically mimicking bread making. I'm shaking it so all the
:47:24. > :47:27.flour is in suspension in the water. Do you know what sort of score
:47:27. > :47:31.you're looking for? A score above 300 is great. Anything above 225
:47:31. > :47:36.means that it would be OK and saleable as milling wheat. The
:47:36. > :47:41.measurement is in seconds. It's the time it takes that weight to drop
:47:41. > :47:44.through the flour and water mix. But this test here, no wonder you look
:47:44. > :47:53.pensive, is the difference between bread wheat or chicken feed.
:47:53. > :47:57.Absolutely. So the thicker and more gloopy it is, the better quality it
:47:57. > :48:04.is? Let's have a look what we've got. It's now expanded all the way
:48:04. > :48:08.up the tube. So the more energy, obviously the longer it takes this
:48:08. > :48:12.to fall through it. And what speed has it taken? It's taken 362
:48:12. > :48:15.seconds. That means we're OK! We're OK with that. Well done. I found
:48:15. > :48:20.that completely nerve wracking. Now, Tom doesn't just grow wheat of
:48:20. > :48:24.course. He grows barley. Tom's barley's already harvested but we're
:48:24. > :48:28.going up to Scotland now where they are just gathering theirs in. And
:48:28. > :48:32.their barley's not just going to be eaten, it's going to be drunk.
:48:32. > :48:36.Barley may look like wheat, but the low gluten content in its grains
:48:36. > :48:40.means it's nowhere near as good for making bread. It is much hardier
:48:40. > :48:43.though, making it well suited to the growing conditions in the north of
:48:43. > :48:47.Britain. So it's become the staple grain of Scotland's whisky industry.
:48:47. > :48:57.The distillery at Roseisle near Inverness gets through 40,000 tonnes
:48:57. > :49:00.every year. At harvest time, 40 of these whopping great trucks arrive
:49:00. > :49:04.here every day. Each one of them fully laden with barley from local
:49:04. > :49:07.farms. But whisky distillers are very particular about the barley
:49:07. > :49:13.they'll use. Only the very finest grains make the grade. All the
:49:13. > :49:17.barley on these trucks has already been quality tested. This is whisky
:49:17. > :49:29.grade barley, but how on earth do you make a drink out of grains?
:49:29. > :49:35.Barley grains are packed full of starch, and through a process known
:49:35. > :49:41.as malting, the grains are tricked into germinating, and this starch is
:49:41. > :49:46.broken down into sugars. Add water and yeast and those sugars turn to
:49:47. > :49:49.alcohol. This clear liquid is whisky in its raw form before it goes off
:49:49. > :49:58.to be aged. See that? That's the alcohol
:49:58. > :50:02.distilled from the barley, but that now goes into oak barrels for three
:50:02. > :50:05.years, sometimes a lot longer, and it's that oak that gives it more
:50:05. > :50:12.flavour and of course that beautiful colour. Lovely! Before the barley
:50:12. > :50:17.flavour and of course that beautiful goes for alcohol, someone has to
:50:17. > :50:20.decide if it's up to scratch. Farmers have to send a sample to the
:50:20. > :50:26.barley bench, where it comes under the scrutiny of Carol Inch. She has
:50:26. > :50:33.the power to pass or fail a harvest, so the farmers call her Rejection
:50:33. > :50:37.Jane. So what are we actually looking for, Carol? We need low
:50:37. > :50:40.nitrogen in this barley because high nitrogen takes up more space within
:50:41. > :50:44.the grain and there's less starch that we convert into sugar. What we
:50:44. > :50:47.need form this barley is low nitrogen because that means we'll
:50:47. > :50:54.have more starch and more starch means more actual alcohol. Nitrogen
:50:54. > :50:58.helps plants grow - it's a key component of fertiliser. But barley
:50:58. > :51:02.farmers need to strike a delicate balance. Too little fertiliser and
:51:02. > :51:05.the crop won't grow as well, but add too much, and the grains run
:51:05. > :51:12.the crop won't grow as well, but add risk of being rejected. Nitrogen
:51:12. > :51:18.within the corns gives you a steely grey colour. So if it's all white,
:51:18. > :51:22.that's what we want. If it's all grey, that's too much nitrogen.
:51:22. > :51:28.We've got about 20-30 grains there and only one looks a bit steely. We
:51:28. > :51:31.can let that go, can't we? Well done, boys, you're in! The barley
:51:31. > :51:33.that passes the test becomes part of over 25 million bottles of whisky
:51:33. > :51:37.produced at Roseisle every year. over 25 million bottles of whisky
:51:37. > :51:47.Whisky is very big business. Keeping the standards up is absolutely
:51:47. > :51:48.essential. You know what? It all starts with sourcing the very best
:51:48. > :51:56.barley. With Tom's grain all in, and our
:51:56. > :52:00.flour back from the millers, I've come to meet Tom's mum. You all
:52:00. > :52:05.right, Tom's Mum? Very well, thank you. So this is the real test, isn't
:52:05. > :52:09.it? We're going to make bread from it. See whether it rises and what it
:52:09. > :52:11.tastes like. This is really quite elastic, nice and cool. But I've got
:52:11. > :52:15.to say, it does feel slightly elastic, nice and cool. But I've got
:52:15. > :52:21.It's because it's wholemeal, so it will be a closer texture than a
:52:21. > :52:27.white loaf. Right, into the tin? Right, pop it in. Now we'll proof it
:52:27. > :52:33.on the Aga for about 40 minutes, and then it'll be ready to cook. Proof
:52:33. > :52:40.first, then in the oven. Look at that. Bread straight from the wheat
:52:40. > :52:43.field. It's been a very frustrating year for Tom, but despite the dismal
:52:43. > :52:47.autumn, endless winter, and summer heat wave, most of the seeds he
:52:47. > :52:54.struggled to plant have made it to harvest. And much of his crop,
:52:54. > :53:10.including the special field, made the grade for milling wheat.
:53:11. > :53:19.This is nice, isn't it? It's nice to sit down, end of a long day. And it
:53:19. > :53:22.might be a mechanised harvest, but what's been incredible for us is to
:53:22. > :53:26.watch how hard you work. It's incredible. But how have you done,
:53:26. > :53:30.mate? I mean, you know pretty much what your costs are. What about your
:53:30. > :53:33.returns? Do you know what kind of price you're going to get? Some of
:53:33. > :53:37.our crops we've already sold and on those ones we've got a really good
:53:37. > :53:41.idea. We know the yield as soon as the combine's gone through so we've
:53:41. > :53:44.got a good idea where we're at and unfortunately it's been a really
:53:44. > :53:48.challenging year. Considering that we had a really wet autumn, followed
:53:48. > :53:50.by a really cold spell in March and then the really hot weather in June.
:53:50. > :53:53.by a really cold spell in March and So the culmination of that means
:53:53. > :53:55.it's not been an exceptional year and we're pretty pleased to be
:53:55. > :53:57.getting something just below and we're pretty pleased to be
:53:57. > :53:59.average. Head above water?Yeah, just about. That's a good place to
:53:59. > :54:03.be. Of course it's not just our Tom just about. That's a good place to
:54:03. > :54:06.here who's been battling against all sorts of conditions to bring in the
:54:06. > :54:10.harvest this year. Farmers all over the country have been doing exactly
:54:10. > :54:13.the same thing. So how have they got on? One of the big national issues
:54:13. > :54:16.for harvest 2013 was planting. Compared to the average amount,
:54:16. > :54:25.farmers didn't get enough wheat seed in the ground. Sadly wheat planting
:54:25. > :54:29.fell short by 20% It was the same for rapeseed. The struggle to plant
:54:29. > :54:33.in the cold, wet Autumn of 2012 got farmers off to a terrible start.
:54:33. > :54:36.What does that mean for wheat totals? The average is 15 million
:54:36. > :54:44.What does that mean for wheat tonnes a year. In 2012 we only grew
:54:44. > :54:49.13.3 million tonnes of wheat. But harvest 2013 is predicted to be even
:54:49. > :54:54.worse. A million tonnes less than last year's dismal result. We had
:54:54. > :54:57.better weather, but our farmers couldn't catch up from a poor
:54:58. > :55:02.beginning. But there's a glimmer of hope. More of our wheat this year
:55:02. > :55:07.should be good enough for flour. What about oilseed rape? Early
:55:07. > :55:12.growth in the wet was devastated by attacks from slugs and pigeons. The
:55:12. > :55:18.warm summer helped but the crop's expected to be down nearly 10% on
:55:18. > :55:22.average. Harvest 2013 was bad for oilseed rape. Without wheat and
:55:22. > :55:28.oilseed rape, farmers desperately tried to make up by planting lots of
:55:28. > :55:34.barley. In 2012 we grew 5.5 million tonnes. What about barley this year?
:55:34. > :55:39.We predict a rise by more than a quarter. But on the whole, the
:55:39. > :55:46.hangover from last year's wash-out has given cereals farmers a big
:55:46. > :55:50.headache in harvest 2013. That news doesn't paint the brightest of
:55:51. > :55:54.pictures does it, Tom? The trouble is this year we've known all along
:55:55. > :55:58.that it wasn't going to be the best year, but around the world we're
:55:58. > :56:02.having a massive global harvest. The UK is having a small harvest. That
:56:02. > :56:06.means our prices are down because of the world supply but in the UK we
:56:06. > :56:10.haven't had that great of a year. But isn't that a double bad whammy?
:56:10. > :56:14.Exactly that. That is the sum of it. We don't have as much to sell and
:56:14. > :56:17.it's at a lower price so there's just not the gross income that there
:56:17. > :56:22.would have been otherwise. So what's going to happen is that we're going
:56:22. > :56:26.to import a lot more and your price is going to go down? We're going to
:56:26. > :56:28.be net importers in the UK for the second year running and we haven't
:56:28. > :56:31.be net importers in the UK for the imported wheat on that scale for
:56:31. > :56:34.decades. Is that right? We've always been wheat self-sufficient. For
:56:34. > :56:36.years we have, Gregg, yeah. I never knew that. Here, talking about
:56:36. > :56:40.self-sufficiencies? Oh, my it's heavy. Is this your bread? I can't
:56:40. > :56:45.lift it! This is as light as a feather! Bit of good news here, and
:56:45. > :56:48.can I show you this? This has never happened to me before but this, I
:56:48. > :56:51.think, is wonderful. That is a beautiful, beautiful loaf of bread.
:56:51. > :56:55.Don't stick your nose in it! Once you get this, you'll want to stick
:56:55. > :56:59.your nose in it! And you know where this comes from? This comes from
:56:59. > :57:02.this land we're sitting on. And that's the first time I've ever had
:57:02. > :57:06.the chance to eat bread from where it's produced. Is that right? I tell
:57:06. > :57:12.you what, that's really brought that home to me. That is absolutely
:57:12. > :57:17.fantastic. Cut it, cut it, cut it. Bit of bread and cheese, Tom? I
:57:17. > :57:24.think you've earned it. Are you proud, Tom? I'm proud. That's a
:57:24. > :57:28.lovely loaf. That is good bread though. That is a really light but
:57:28. > :57:32.earthy and filling loaf. I feel at one with this field now. We take it
:57:32. > :57:35.for granted. When you're walking around the countryside, you don't
:57:35. > :57:38.realise what it's used for. You don't link the two together and this
:57:38. > :57:42.is an opportunity to just really make that link. Tom, thank you very
:57:42. > :57:47.much for having us here. No, no. It's been really enjoyable. We've
:57:47. > :57:51.learned so, so much. If you'd like to learn more you can: and there's a
:57:51. > :57:54.leaflet available which is full of information. And I suspect that
:57:54. > :57:57.there are some recipes there as well. Not just some recipes there,
:57:57. > :58:00.some fantastic recipes and ways to find out how to use our British
:58:00. > :58:03.harvest. And also there's information on there about finding
:58:03. > :58:09.harvest events near you, maybe as good as this. Well done, son. Cut us
:58:09. > :58:24.another bit? Next time, a sweet treat. Just what
:58:24. > :58:30.are the secrets of perfect fruit? And how have our fruit farmers done
:58:30. > :58:38.this year? Join us tomorrow at nine.