Clarkson shares concern over ‘catastrophic’ harvest
11th August 2025
Jeremy Clarkson has described this year’s harvest at Diddly Squat as “catastrophic”, prompting a debate on food security.
Clarkson said drought conditions this year caused his beans to die, dismal barley yields, and just two of the 400,000 beetroot crops he planted to survive.
Writing on X, he said: ‘It looks like this year’s harvest will be catastrophic. That should be a worry for anyone who eats food. If a disaster on this scale had befallen any other industry, there would be a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth.’
He later joked that he’s put all his grain ‘in a hoover bag’, adding: ‘Our beans died. Our barley yields were dismal. And I won’t grow chickpeas because they are disgusting.’
Other farmers were quick to agree, with Ally Hunter Blair saying it’s been the ‘worst harvest of my life to date’, adding that if Clarkson wanted a Herefordshire branch of his farm shop, there’s ‘plenty of space in my grain store.’
Suffolk farmer Tom Jewers agreed and said the only upsides were: ‘It was over quickly, didn’t use much diesel and there’s loads of room in the grain stores for the machinery’.
Meanwhile organic dairy farmer Rob Perry reported that he had only half the forage he needs for his cows this winter.
The posts sparked a wider debate around food security and farm profitability, with Clarkson noting that there’s ‘not a cat’s in hell’s chance’ that the farm would survive without his other businesses, including his farm shop, pub and TV career.
No Farmers No Food commented: ‘People see their food in a supermarket. But they don’t see what is involved in getting it there. From the field to the fork. The long hours. The costs. The unforeseen weather conditions. You have been a huge help in developing wider public awareness on all of this.’
AHDB harvest report
AHDB’s latest harvest report (released on 8th August) states that the winter barley and oilseed rape harvests are now complete, with yields improving as harvest continues, despite stop-start progress over the last couple of weeks, caused by short spells of often heavy rain.
Winter barley is only 1% down on the five year average while OSR yields are averaging at the highest since 2011 for the winter sown crop and oil content is extremely high.
The oat harvest is 48% complete (on 6th August), with yields back by 5%, but this is not representative, as it mainly accounts for winter data.
The winter wheat harvest is also 48% complete with yields of 7.66t/ha (1% below average). Quality is good, according to the report – group 1s average 13.5% protein.
Some crops have lower Hagberg falling numbers because of recent rains, with moisture ranges from 12.2–17%.
The spring barley harvest was 19% complete at the time of the report but AHDB said early yields are encouraging; up 21% on the five-year average.
However, more data is needed to draw precise conclusions, as the areas harvested are mostly in eastern and southern regions, so not representative of the UK, the report concludes.
Pulses are 13% complete.
The fourth AHDB harvest 2025 report is due on Friday 22nd August.
Read more harvest news.
