32 minutes | Friday, 5 September 2025
On Southampton's Voice FM, Xan Phillips speaks with George Crossley at Rushmere Farm, detailing their 5-year journey transitioning from chemical to organic farming.
George explains the challenges and benefits of organic farming, particularly the initial low yields due to soil requiring regeneration without synthetic fertilizers.
He emphasizes planting diverse herbs and legumes, along with rotational grazing to revitalize soil health.
George highlights how organic farming reduces chemical dependency and fosters a balanced ecosystem, enhancing biodiversity and food quality.
Despite skepticism from neighbouring conventional farmers, Rushmere Farm has begun showcasing successful yields.
The conversation underscores the broader benefits of organic farming for environmental sustainability and human health, advocating for supportive policies and diversified farm activities to sustain the farm economically.
Transcript
Xan Phillips: [00:00:00] On Southampton's Voice FM, this is Your Green Voice. My name is Xan Phillips and I'm speaking to you on the South Downs and I'm at Rushmere Farm. And uh, next to me is, uh, farmer George Crossley. And George, welcome to the show. How are you?
George Crossley: Hello. Very well. Thank you. Thank you for asking.
Xan Phillips: That's a pleasure. Uh, lovely to be here. I'm actually here strange enough on a working holiday and, uh, mainly working for you, uh, and doing things around the farm. We'll talk about that a little later on. But obviously my role is to talk about the environment and green things.
And here we are on a, um, organic farm. How long has the farm been organic?
George Crossley: So we started the conversion five years ago, so three year conversion period. And yeah, now we've been organic officially for two years.
Xan Phillips: Some people might recall that, um, to become organic used to be a much longer, and I'm, I'm thinking seven years.
George Crossley: Yeah, that's right. Um, it used to be seven years than five. Now it's three. Um, it just makes it a bit more achievable to, to get there. Obviously you go through a period of, of low, low yield, low production, um, and then ultimately you achieve higher prices from being organic, but you don't get there until you're certified.
So if the process is shorter, it makes it more achievable for, for people.
Xan Phillips: So why, why the low yield? Is that because you, you don't grow or is it because you stop using fertilizer?
George Crossley: Um, so typically, yeah, so, so 99% of the country is farmed chemically. Um, and, and a lot of the, the soils in our country now are quite depleted, including our own, um, at this point.
So when you shift away from using chemicals such as synthesized fertilizer, you are in a situation where your soil's actually not functioning at the point it would be naturally in a natural [00:02:00] ecosystem, like in a forest or something. Um, and you need to really work quite hard to regenerate that soil in order to recover, you know, a yield that you might have otherwise achieved before chemical, uh, agriculture started.
Xan Phillips: And does that happen naturally, or is other things that you have to put into the soil to give it a a second chance?
George Crossley: So, yeah, left alone, eventually the soil would recover and start working, functioning fully. Um, but you can encourage it, um, in certain ways. So we do that by, by resting for a number of years.
And then in those resting periods, we'll have, um, very diverse, what we call herbal days. So mixtures of herbs, legumes, and grasses, which, um which build fertility. They have all kinds of different functions themselves. Um, different routing depths, different ability to fix things from the atmosphere or draw things outta the soil.
So we kind of fill that field with all these good plants that do good things for the soil and then that. And enables biology to come back and fungi to come back into the soil and start functioning properly. And then the other thing you can do, which we're increasingly doing now, is grazing with livestock.
So if you graze in a certain way, um, you know, in a way that was kind of probably natural a thousand years ago, where tight herds of large grazing ruminants herbivores come through. They pick off all the best bits in the plant and then they move on. And that allows the plants to recover and, and build their root stock.
And it also feeds biology in the soil. Um, and you end up with this kind of perfect balance, which means you can accelerate the process of improving the soil.
Xan Phillips: Yeah. 'cause you mentioned, I mean, I'm, I'm actually staying in the shepherd's hut and you know, I, I said, well, are there gonna be any sheep? But you've got some sheep coming along in the next couple of weeks to do some, do some [00:04:00] gardening for you, basically.
George Crossley: Yeah. Yeah. So we use, we really use cows for building fertility. Um, the, the way the rumen ruminant works is, is for some reason extremely beneficial for the way that the ecosystem functions. And then we use sheep really as a cheap lawnmower, and they just come in and cut everything short before we go in to plant crops.
Xan Phillips: So, so the main reason I'm picking up then is that organic farming is a. Uh, no to chemicals. Yeah. And from you yourself though, is, was it the no to chemicals that you wanted to do or was it that you just felt that organic farming produced a better crop
George Crossley: for me initially 'cause I was taking over from my dad had to prove that it was gonna work financially and for a farm of our size, um. It looked, certainly looked like the best option was to be organic. Um, I think many farmers fall into the trap of thinking that high yields means, means, you know, the best profitability or high income, but actually. You know, there's, there's really high input costs in a, in a high yield system or conventional high yield system.
So it's kind of a false economy where you're spending a lot, uh, to get a bit more. Um, whereas what we've done and what really works financially, I think, and, and I'm surprised more people aren't cluing up to it. Is that actually okay. We, we've reduced our yields quite significantly because we've got these, you know, these resting periods we're not constantly cropping.
Um, but we're putting in, you know, we're saving huge amount of money on, on chemistry. Um, and so that was my kind of route in with the family to persuade them that that's how we'll make this work. Um, but also I'm very environmentally conscious myself and quite aware [00:06:00] that, uh, I'm not a chemist, um, but I'm part of an ecosystem and I, um, even though I'm not an an ecologist, I have some understanding of how complicated and intricate an ecosystem is and needs to be to fully function.
I was pretty keen to move away from, from chemicals that I didn't understand. Um, and you know, we'd have an advisor who, which is very typical, who would come and, um, advise on what chemicals to use. Um, and they would typically be the same people that sold the chemicals. Um, and so, you know, you, you'd end up in, in a situation where you are, you're putting a huge amount of money into something you don't really know what it does um, long term and you're often persuaded that those things are doing, you know, very specific activities like killing a particular plant or killing a particular insect and that they don't have wider consequences.
But actually the side effects of, of killing one thing, um, you know, impacts other things. And the knock on effects and even the effects of the degraded chemicals after a few years are still quite significant on, on the health of an ecosystem.
And, um, we are discovering more and more about that the more time goes on and actually realizing that, you know, healthy ecosystem manages all your problems without the need for any additions.
Xan Phillips: Have you, have you noticed an improvement in the quality of insects that has, uh, flying around your farm?
George Crossley: Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah. And, and it goes all the way up the food chain. So, you know, we, we've got really, you know, buzzing fields now. Um, lots of birds and then lots of birds of prey too. Couple of barn owls, you know, pairs of barn owls, which I'm really excited about 'cause it shows that that whole ecosystem below them is, is functioning.
Um, and yeah, I mean, we have a situation now where, yeah, our pest problems are now, [00:08:00] are now managed by other species. So typically larger insects managing smaller insects or, or yes, birds managing certain insects. Um, for example, in our pea crop a couple of weeks ago, absolutely full of aphids. And, um, previously in that situation, the agronomist would've said to you, you really need to put on this insecticide to kill these aphids. Maybe a couple of doses, a few passes to make sure the job is done. Um, and, but we, you know, in an organic system, we're not allowed to do that. Um, we sat there nervously looking at these aphids, eating the peas. Um, and then a week later, hundreds of lady birds just, you know, snacking on aphids to their heart's content until two days ago.
Not a sign, not a sign of an aphid and the lady birds just fly off and find something else to eat. It's
amazing.
Xan Phillips: So just like your, your, your herd of sheep and cows coming in to tidy up your, um, your, your farm then the, the, the, a herd of flock of lady birds coming in to get rid of the aphids.
George Crossley: Yeah, absolutely. And. The other example of that we had initially, 'cause we were very nervous about slugs as a lot of people in their gardens I'm sure are. Um, and we used to put down a lot of slug pellets to make sure we didn't have that problem. Um, various things over the years and some of which now kind of reside in our, our water system for a long time.
Things like, you know, if you check out your Southern water, um water quality report, you'll find aldehyde in there. And that's a, that's a slug from slug pellets that we used to use 20 years ago. Um, but we used to use those systematically killing slugs. And then what I didn't realize is that things that were eating, those slugs are also being poisoned.
So when we stopped the first year, we had a terrible slug [00:10:00] problem. Um, as you can imagine. They just really got quite out of hand. And then the next year it just decreased, and then the next year there was, it wasn't a considered a problem anymore. Okay. A few slugs, but these predatory, you know, things like beetles, various different, quite ferocious looking beetles that I, you know, don't, hadn't seen before.
They're back and they're, they're snacking on slugs and slug eggs and, um, suddenly the balanced ecosystem is just doing its thing.
Xan Phillips: This is fantastic, and because none of us generally realise what you're talking about is how much chemical goes into farming, and that obviously chemical goes into the food and into the water system, and then into us.
So not only growing organic, but trying to buy as much organic as possible gives you a healthier lifestyle.
George Crossley: I think that's true, and I know it's. It is currently, you know, it's considerably more expensive to, to buy organic food. Um, and it's, and it's a hard one because, you know, really I think in supermarkets, which should be labeling things, chemical food and food rather than organic food and food, because all the food that's not organic that we are eating, myself included, has chemicals on it, it's being grown with chemicals, and almost all of those are used for killing things. Um, and whilst they're, they are specifically designed for killing very particular things, um, you know, I I, you don't want to be eating something that kills something else. I think there's a good chance it's not gonna be good for you.
Um, and when you grow things organically, you look at the whole system and I'm, I'm not trying to to brag about that in any way, and in, in many ways [00:12:00] it's, it's just a simpler system where you, you are really relying on nature to do its job. And where we would use to, or chemical farms will supply a plant with these, a few very particular nutrients that it needs nitrogen, potassium, and phosphate amongst maybe a few others.
When an organic system gets functioning and a soil is fully functioned, there's thousands of different, um, compounds and minerals and elements in there that are being drawn outta the soil by that plant, and you've got a, then you've got a nutrient rich, nutrient dense product, which, okay, it's more expensive, but it's gonna be a lot better for you.
It's probably gonna fill you up more. Um, and my latest sort of thing is that, um, you know, it is expensive to eat organic. And I, I understand that, and I by no means eat, eat fully organic. I just try to choose specific things that, um, you know, that I, I think overall will be better. But if, you know, if we could, for example, if we could eat just 50% of our food organically, um then we'd be in a situation where the biodiversity in this country and globally would be just massively improved. And the carbon sequestration also massively improved, um, to a point where, you know, we could actually fix this climate crisis. And we could also probably fix the, the crisis we have around human health at the moment.
Xan Phillips: In fact, there's a lot of crises going on at the moment. And, um, I mean the weather itself, um, I mean I I, I did hear the other day that people were talking about the weather changing enough to, to start doing olives.
I mean, is that something. That you are thinking of in the future you might be doing here? Or are there other exotic plants [00:14:00] that you're thinking or, or crops that you are gonna be bringing in?
George Crossley: I'm still, I'm still relatively novice at this business, so I'm kind of sticking to what, um, more conventional crops at the moment.
But definitely thinking about moving into, you know, away from peas for, for cattle, feed towards chickpeas, for human feed, for, for human food, for example. Um. And yeah, I think there's opportunities for, for, for fruits like peaches and apricots, which I'd love to grow here. Um, and yeah, the vineyards are doing are doing great.
Um, so there's some, you know, it's lovely and warm. There's some advantages to, to climate change, but, um, yeah, no, I think, yeah, I'll stick to kind of what I know at this stage and hopefully get better at farming and, and, um, move into something more interesting.
Xan Phillips: I, you mentioned peas, you haven't actually said what else? You're growing here. I mean, it's, um, are you, are you an arable farm?
George Crossley: Yes. I would say we're an organic arable farm, so we, uh, I'm not exactly sure how that's defined, but I think, um, it's probably crops that you can harvest with a combine harvester. So we grow everything to this kind of rock hard and dry, and then we harvest it.
So things like wheat. Uh, so typically in our rotation we would grow oats, then wheat, then um, some peas. Sometimes I'd grow them as a bi-crop. Peas with oats or peas with wheat. Uh, and then another crop, um, possibly another legume like peas or. Um, depending on how the soil's doing at that point. Um, and then the next part of the rotation is kind of a resting phase.
So, so we grow four crops every year. Um, and we also have some, some of the land resting. Um, yeah,
Xan Phillips: I mean, 'cause um, um, before we started [00:16:00] there, some bags of flour arrived. And, um, is, is that your first delivery of flour?
George Crossley: Uh, yeah, so we just started working with, um, a brilliant mill up in Essex, um, called Gil Chesters, where they will mill small amounts of wheat for, for farmers or for bakers who need it.
Um, and that's a, that's a massive step for us because, um, okay, this firm's not, not very small, but, um, it's, it's allowed us to basically break away from. A commodity, uh, system. So our oats, our wheat, uh, barley, all those sorts of things are kind of governed in a commodity, in the commodity market by a register.
And on that register are the things that you can grow. And it's limited. And it means that actually, you know, very limited number of varieties are being, or species are being grown in, um, in northern Europe and across the world. Um, and so now we're able to grow smaller amounts of, uh, interesting tasty varieties or even populations of varieties.
So you have multiple species within a field. Um. So we grow now an old variety of wheat, uh, called Erland, um, and have experimented with several others as well. And they're not on the commodity register, so you can't sell them into the, into to a merchant to, you know, to, to distribute overseas because there's not enough bulk of that to go to the big mills.
Um, so we are growing small amounts of more interesting stuff that bakers are, are really keen on. We could send it to this fantastic mill in Essex, Gilchester's. Um, and they'll do, you know, they'll mail that for us into, into, into flour, [00:18:00] um, in relatively small quantities of kind of, you know, 20, 30 tons rather than hundreds of tons.
Xan Phillips: So hopefully you'll give that or sell it to a baker and then you'll be going down. Eating one of your cakes, I suppose if it
George Crossley: Yeah,
Xan Phillips: The flour is most of a, most of a cake apart from the eggs. I mean, uh, is, has that happened yet?
George Crossley: Uh, not yet. So I'm excited for, um, yeah, a couple of bakers to start using it.
Um, we've been chipp. Shipping grain up to London for a while now to, to bakers, you know, very, very enthusiastic and very, um, skilled bakers in London who, who have their own mills. Um, but now we're getting our own flour so we can ship it to, to more bakers around and, and, and hopefully, see now I'll get a loaf back or a, yeah, or a pastry or something and they, you know, they'd be saying it's good.
So I'm waiting to see for myself.
Xan Phillips: I'd like to go back to a subject we talked about earlier where, uh, you were basically waving goodbye to the chemical companies. What did the salesman, the rep, say to you? Um,
George Crossley: so our, our agronomist who told us what chemicals to use, when to apply them and supplied us with the goods.
When we said we were going organic, well, when dad told him we were going organic, he, he said, we'll, we'll see you in two years and hung up the phone. And that was five years ago.
Xan Phillips: How did your dad feel about that? Was it, was it a bit, bit of a worry? Or, or, or, quite, quite funny.
George Crossley: I think he's on the funny side, but also, yeah, I think, you know, he's, he's, he's been, uh, subject to a lot of pressure, I [00:20:00] guess, from the whole farming industry and these companies and his agronomist to think that actually you can't farm without these chemicals.
Um, and so, you know, to go cold Turkey like we did was, you know, he, he definitely had to be much braver than in my naivety. I did.
Xan Phillips: Well, I can, yeah, I can understand that because there you are, young, fresh-faced. This is a brand new idea. You've got the energy, you've got the zeal where in a way yes, you're going against what are now modern established practices as opposed to you actually becoming reasonably old fashioned.
George Crossley: Yeah, that's true. And um. Yeah, I think if we had the, the, the knowledge of people that would be sort of a hundred and something years old now, I think we'd, we'd learn a lot from them about, about what they did, um, to, to combat issues such as disease and pests and weeds and things like that. But, um, we now have lots of modern tools and knowledge that we can share.
Um, yeah, I think we can be actually more effective than we were back then, even though in some degree. It just seem like we're going backwards.
Xan Phillips: So how have people around you reacted then? Because around us there's, uh, I dunno how many farms you've got around here. I think I've known about there's two or three.
Is it, is it more than that?
George Crossley: Uh, the nearest organic farm to here, I think is Goodwood Estate. They have a organic beef. Uh, I think they have organic dairy down there too. Um, but yeah, we're pretty, uh, we're sort of an island of organic farming surrounded by. A lot of, uh, conventional farming, not necessarily like high intensity chemical farming, but there are instances of farming like that around us.
Yeah, it's definitely my, it's definitely, you know, the norm. And, uh, generally I sort of feel like the response when I tell people that we are an organic farm is [00:22:00] that it's kind of a joke. It's a bit of a like. It is a bit of a, like, oh, you're just doing it for fun, for a hobby sort of thing. Um, you're not gonna grow any food.
Um, you know, you're, you're obviously supplementing that with some other, you know, income. Uh, it's, yeah, it is not taken very seriously. Um, and I think it'll take probably a long time for a lot of people to. To see that actually it does work. We do produce food, yes, our yields are smaller, um, in terms of, you know, the food that we produce, but actually that in terms of the, the biodiversity and the kind of associated, uh, you know, our ecosystem costs are way lower than, um, that of a, of another more conventional farm.
Xan Phillips: Have you been able to, um, show them. A, a good yield and a, a good profit yet, or is that, is that a couple of years down the road?
George Crossley: Um, so, so one of the farmers who, who said, when I said, oh, we, we were, he said, oh yeah, I heard you're organic now. Word travels fast. Um, uh, what did he say? Something like, um, not expecting to produce any food then are you?,
Um, and now he does. Um, our combining and, um, and for the first few years he, you know, driving the combine quite fast, into quite thin crops. And for the first year this year he's, he's actually having to slow down and, um, you know, I'm having to rush back with the tractor and trailer 'cause he's filling up fast as, you know, really, really healthy looking yield of oats.
Um. Uh, in our first, in the first year of our rotation, which is the, is the most fertile year of the rotation. Um, and so yeah, if we can keep [00:24:00] that kind of consistently high yield through the rotation and over the next few years, then, then I think there's gonna be a, a lot of people, well, hopefully a lot of the neighboring farmers will look over the hedge and think actually, wow, he's done that without any of the kind of the costs, those risky costs like fertilizer that, you know, fluctuate dramatically with, um, the state of the petrochemical industry or whatever, defines those costs that they're completely susceptible to and can mean that one year they're profitable and when, and the next they're not. Um, yeah, hopefully they'll, they'll see that actually.
Yeah. It's, it's doable without,
Xan Phillips: hm. So was there a sort of a, a quiet sense of pride to, to have that experience with a, a slow combine and you chasing back down the road to fill it, uh, fill up your trailer.
George Crossley: Yeah, definitely. And like a, and maybe a, a bit of smugness too, but I have to be, you know, I have to be cautious. It's, we are only, we're only year five of doing it and, uh, things might change, you know, we might. We might suddenly find we drop off a cliff in terms of our fertility. People have warned of that. Uh, we might find that our weed burden is suddenly massive and we wished we had herbicide back again. And, uh, yeah.
So I'm sort of, I'm reserved in my, in, in, in my commentary of that, how well it's going, but I'm quietly pleased and and assured that we can go on certainly for a few more years, um, and hopefully many, many more. Um.
Xan Phillips: Well, it sounds like you've, you've really got it together and that your patience is paying off.
If you were, um, sitting in front of the leaders of not only, um, the farming unions, but also the people doing commodities, government people in charge, what would you be [00:26:00] asking them to do? What would be your message to them right now?
George Crossley: Uh, I think at this particular point in time, we, um, we've suddenly, uh, had a, what seems to be a little bit of an attack on farmers.
Um, there was the inheritance tax thing, which I think many people are probably aware of. Um, and that is contentious. But I think what's even more frightening is, um, that subsidies are being withdrawn. So for, for, for a very long time. Um, farming across, you know, the whole world, um, has been supported by subsidies, and that includes the UK.
We were very well supported when we were in Europe, um, for subsidies, uh, for, for, for food production, but also for, for, um, for conservation. So. You know, quite a big part of our income would come from, you know, steward, stewarding the environment, um, uh, and alongside food production. And I think that has been really important.
And now we're in a situation where those are being withdrawn. So not only does that make us, uh, not competitive with other countries who continue to be subsidized, like, you know, our neighbors in France and Holland and um, Europe, but it also means that we're in a situation where we may not be able to afford to, to, to do the conservation efforts that we were previously doing.
So 30% of this farm is, is in what we call countryside stewardship, which is this kind of, uh, is a, ultimately it was a, initially it was an EU scheme. Um. And we are still in that. And that means we are, we are supported to look after birds and bees and insects, butterflies, and, and look after the, the environment for all kinds of reasons.
You know, biodiversity in itself is crucial, but managing our [00:28:00] water, managing the catchment, um, managing, you know, the, the runoff, um. Yeah, lots of reasons to continue to do that. And suddenly we're in a situation where actually if we lose those, we need to be more productive. Uh, so every corner that we are looking after for nature, you know, really needs to be producing crops that we can sell.
Otherwise, the business just doesn't work. And I think that if, yeah, if I was sat in front of, um, a group of leaders who had the ability to change that now. I'd be asking them to really carefully consider what, what they're going to do to the countryside if, if those subsidies are withdrawn.
Xan Phillips: And of course, um, you're having to diverse and this, this week, holiday week, wild ro or wild rogues, um, is part of it.
Do you've got a barn? Um, there's just recently been an event there. So is this all part of you as , the son coming back and looking and saying, with with fresh eyes, you know, we could do, you know, people are wanting to explore more in the, um, the farming world. Um, this is, this is the, a good way to start bringing some more income.
George Crossley: Yeah, I mean, definitely I think most farms of this size and, and in fact most farms in the UK we'll have diversifications because agriculture is, is is quite risky. Um, you know, there's always change. Um. In habits or in government, um, that affect how much income we make. So yeah, we have holiday lets on the farm.
Uh, we also have, uh, livery stables. Um, I have an oat milk company called Toates, um, and we have some events in the barn. And yeah, lots of bits and bobs that just mean that we are a bit more resilient, um, going forward. But also, yeah, I guess the tourism bit for me is an opportunity to kind of, try and share a bit of what we have here, [00:30:00] which we're very, very lucky to have.
Um, and also to share the importance of, of looking after it. Um, and I think hopefully people when they come here, get out of the experience that, um, abundance is, is really possible. You know, nature takes over very, very quickly, um, and can fix, you know, really all of our problems if we let it. And that might be mental health or actual kind of nutritional gut health or whatever it is.
Um, but I'm, yeah, really keen to share that and for people to, to share that with me and help understand and push that out to a wider audience if possible.
Xan Phillips: Well, I've thorough enjoyed this conversation, George. Um, you've done some work for me now. I'm off to do some work for you. You got me hay bailing next, haven't you?
George Crossley: Yeah, yeah, that's good. Great to have some extra hands. We'll be doing it every year at this sort of time, so end of June, beginning of July. Um, it'd be great to have more people along if they're up for it.
Xan Phillips: Well, uh, George Crossley from, uh, Rushmere Farm thank you very much for talking to us on Your Green Voice and, uh, we wish you best of luck with your organic odyssey.
George Crossley: Thank you very much. Thanks Xan.