Harvesting for grain and silage crops is more or less over for 2024, after one of the most challenging years in decades.

With the autumn and winter of 2023 proving extremely wet, cereal farmers were prevented from sowing winter crops in many areas of the country.

That resulted in them relying on spring-grown crops – always a bit more risky, with later harvests often coinciding with mixed weather conditions.

However, even in Fermanagh, farmers growing cereals managed to make the most of some of the warmer, sunnier days in September and into October to gather in the 2024 harvest.

Our photographs show combining on three Fermanagh farmers this autumn, the crops comprising spring-sown barley and oats.

However, with reasonable dry ground conditions extending into October, many have planted winter crops successfully, with the potential for a heavier yield in 2025.

The English wheat harvest is a good barometer of the overall harvest.

Government estimates indicate a decrease of 22 per cent in the wheat harvest from 2023.

The area planted to wheat decreased by 11 per cent, and yields were down by around 12 per cent.

Barley showed a slight increase in yield of 2.7 per cent with a swing towards spring-sown crops from winter barley because of poor ground conditions in the third quarter of 2023.

Some farmers turned to oats instead of spring wheat, so that crop has also shown increases in yields.

The reduced cereal yields will result in a shrinking volume of straw for sale to livestock farmers and mushroom growers.

It was also evident in parts of Northern Ireland that spring beans played a major role in cropping, used as a high-protein crop in the livestock feed industry.

Grass silage shows variability in quality across farms, although reasonable quantities were made by the end of September.