Crops like the UK economy have stagnated and show very little growth. It seems as though crops are late this year in developing, but just how late are they. We've looked back over the last eight years crop reports and checked growth stages for winter wheat and winter oilseed rape for the same period in each year.

Winter oilseed rape

Only in 2008 and 2007 had the most forward oilseed rape crops started to flower by late March but in four out of the eight years crops were at the green bud stage by now. In 2010 most crops were pretty much at the same growth stage as they are now. So in comparison winter rape this year is a little later than expected.

Winter wheat

The picture is a little more complex with this crop partly as there are so many late sown crops this season. However, comparing September sown crops the most forward were in 2007 when these early sowings had final leaf 3 emerging by end March. In 2005, 2009 and 2010 most September sown crops were at end of tillering pretty much as this season crops are now. In 2006 and 2012 early sown crops were at GS 31, and in 2008 and 2011 at GS 30. The winter wheat crop this year is amongst the latest we have recorded over the last eight years and that's just the early sown crops.

Table comparing growth stages of most forward crops of winter oilseed rape and winter wheat for late March 2005 - 2013