Texel farmer Marco Zoetelief sees with sorrow how a large part of his potato harvest has been lost. And not just because of the wetness. The geese also cause a lot of damage to the crops. He expects that he has now suffered a few tons of damage.
The excessive rainfall of recent times has brought… many farmers in trouble. Texel farmer Marco Zoetelief has fifty hectares of land that grows seed potatoes. A large part has already been dug up, but eleven hectares still need to be cleared. A large part of those potatoes can be considered lost due to excessive rainfall.
Due to the late spring, the potatoes went into the ground late and growth started later. “The potatoes have to go into the ground at the beginning of April. But due to the wet and cold spring, it was now a month later. But then you only harvest a month later,” says Marco Zoetelief.
The seed potatoes are for export. Wet weather is disastrous, because the potatoes have to go into the bag dry. Otherwise they will rot and attack each other. “We often have wet periods,” says Zoetelief. “But then there usually follows a dry period, which gives you the opportunity to get the harvest out of the ground.”
That is not the case now, because it continues to rain incessantly on Texel. The fields have now turned into large bodies of water where potatoes can no longer grow. “If you have dry weather two days in a row, that is very special.”
The potatoes actually had to be out of the ground before October 1. After the crops have been harvested, many farmers are obliged to sow a so-called catch crop, such as a certain type of grass. This is a crop grown after harvest to absorb fertilizers, especially nitrate. This prevents these substances from ending up in surface water.
“That’s not going to work now,” says Zoetelief. “It was already moved to October 15, but that date has long since passed. We sowed plots at the end of October, but nothing came of it. It is of no use at all. I would have preferred to have everything out by October 1. “
Zoetelief stands with his back against the wall and is now having sleepless nights. He tries to save what can still be saved.
“We also had a ‘blow’ of water once in the summer. Then 80 millimeters fell in one night. If a potato is under water for too long, rot will set in. And if you dig up that rotten potato, then one lights the other. And then the whole batch rots away. So you have to wait until the bad potatoes have rotted in the ground, so that the good ones remain. Then you harvest them.”
Zoetelief has already taken many measures. “We have dug ditches everywhere so that the water can drain away. The drainage is also in order.” But that is not enough to remove the excess water.”
Many potatoes are processed into a spine. These are small thresholds of 5 or 10 centimeters high, so that the potatoes are drier. But that’s where the second problem lurks. “The top layer is eaten by the geese,” says Zoetelief.
“It’s no longer possible, they just laugh at you, so to speak”
“They are the greylag geese and Egyptian geese. I go to the plots every morning to chase them away. But you turn around and they are there again. It is no longer possible, they just laugh at you, so to speak.”
He makes reports in order to be able to recover damages if necessary. But that creates an enormous administrative burden. “I actually can’t accept that. Authorities make it very complicated and then half of the farmers don’t start with it. But I will take up that fight.”
The geese trample the ditches so that the potatoes are above the ground. A disadvantage is that the water can no longer drain as quickly. “And they just eat all the potatoes. It’s terrible.”
These will be exciting times, because all consignments still have to be inspected before they are transported. But that still does not provide certainty. “A potato can already be sick before it travels to Algeria, for example. With a sick specimen, all potatoes are affected and the entire batch may still be rejected afterwards. Then we lose the yield.”
“In addition, we will also receive a bill for the transport costs. We now face that with fear and trembling, because we have a long way to go. You don’t know where this will end.”