MANY farmers in Kent are struggling to harvest their cereal crops following one of the wettest Augusts since records began.

Fields of wheat and barley are still waiting to be collected - even though most crops should have been brought in during June, July or early August.

"It's very bad this year," said Mark Ensoll, spokesman for the National Farmers' Union Maidstone and Staplehurst branch.

"We had bet on this being a very good harvest. There were good growing conditions at first, but if you can't get in there with a combine harvester, you have a problem."

When wheat crops are left in wet conditions they start to germinate in the ear, Mr Ensoll added, leaving poor quality low value crops.

Many farmers are now looking skywards every morning, hoping for a long enough gap in the wet weather to allow them to get the remaining creeals in.

"We are a lot luckier in Kent than they are up the country, as the further north you go the wetter it has been," Mr Ensoll added.

"Kent farmers will lose a great deal of money this year," he said. It's just another expense which we do not need."

As a last resort, farmers who did not get their crops in during the better weather could sell the ruined crops as cattle feed - but will barely make a penny.

John Emery, who runs South Point Farm at Hawkenbury, near Staplehurst, said he felt positive things were looking up on his 1800 acres of wheat, barley, rape and beans.

"It's a nuisance but these things happen," he said, "farmers wouldn't do the job they do if they didn't expect hitches now and again.

"We just can't combine at the moment, it's far too wet. The crop itself is too wet and the combines cannot work when the ground is too soggy. Wheat is worth very little at the moment anyway, only about £30 to £40 a tonne because the Russian and European harvests have been good."

Wheat is normally worth at least £70 a tonne, but the record-breakingly inclement weather has cut that price to an all-time low.

The average rainfall in Kent so far this August is 79mm - double what it should be according to experts from London's Meteorological Office.

The UK's August average so far this month is 120mm - which looks set to beat the previous wet record of 127mm in 1992 as more rain is forecast.

If that does happen, this month will be the wettest since electronic data collection began in 1961.

"Essentially it's the boundary between warmer sub-tropical air and northern polar air that is causing excessive rainfall," said MET office spokesman, Barry Gromett

"In summer, the boundary between the two types of air tends to retreat northwards, but this summer it hasn't done that and instead has hovered over our latitude.

"This has left us facing frontal systems from the Atlantic, which are sub-tropical and can hold more water," he added.