Standing Straw Continues To Break Records Across The Board
July 2026
An exceptional entry of over 2,250 acres brought in a large crowd of keen bidders in the room as well as many more online for Greenslade Taylor Hunt’s popular annual standing straw sale at Sedgemoor Auction Centre.
More than 50 successful buyers, competing strongly with their counterparts, yielded the following averages, with the vast majority of lots ‘going up a gear’ on the previous year:
Winter Barley £174.41/acre
Winter Wheat £166.78/acre
Spring Barley £149.52/acre
Oilseed Rape £64.64/acre
Some rip-roaring prices were seen across the board with Winter Barley reaching £265/acre, Winter Wheat fetching an extraordinary £270/acre, Spring Barley achieving as much as £175/acre and Oilseed Rape reaching £105/acre.
Auctioneer Tom Mellor said: “Despite our acreage being largely similar to the 2025 auction, it was noticeable how certain growers have had a change of direction and have dropped out of the auction system, with lack of margin growing cereals in recent years often the reason quoted.
The 2026 auction was well supported with vendors from Wiveliscombe to Taunton and across to South Petherton, allowing purchasers the opportunity to bid on the standing crops on offer. It was noticeable how the heavier crops this year really went up a notch, when we saw six lots achieve in excess of £250/acre and 21 lots, being nearly a sixth of the entry, achieving over and above £200/acre.”
The margins to grow cereals are ludicrously tight. The costs of production have gone up substantially and the cost of the end product – the grain, has hardly lifted. That is likely due to a depressed global market, so unfortunately it hits home here too.
In addition to this, the demand by ‘non-cereal’ land uses and crops has continued to grow at pace. The likes of local biodigesters are mopping up lots of land which is coming out of food production and into energy production.
To realistically compete for the finite resource that is arable land, the value of grain will need to lift quite substantially.
If you are interested in finding out what the auction system can offer you either for next season or by private treaty, Tom Mellor would be happy to help. Please contact him at [email protected] or 01278 410250.