THEY SAY a week is a long time in politics! But I do not think farming is any different.

In the first week of June, we had had more rain than in the whole of May – which was 2-inches and, amazingly, we did get our silage all in the pit between 10.00am on Sunday, June 4 and and 2.00am on the Monday!

Our new silage contractor, plus the team at home, did an excellent job, as the forecast was for heavy rain by Monday morning. It was certainly accurate, with a bad outlook for the rest of the first week of June, so I'm glad it was all done.

Usually, this is an important week for most livestock farmers when the bulk of winter forage is secured. Having said that, I cannot recall a time when first cut silage has been so spread out.

From the first few days of May, I have seen fields cleared, which was tempted by the excellent weather conditions throughout the month.

We have certainly procured a full pit of silage but, unfortunately, it is not as dry as last year's first cut, which you may recall, had perfect conditions for the first week of June.

The pit on our second farm still has several hundred tonnes in it which we will continue to use until August, so we will not need as many acres for second cut.

How we are going to utilise all the extra acres of grass in a few weeks' time will be another challenge because the chances of acquiring our criteria of store cattle will be virtually impossible. The supply of 500kg-plus stores this year is non-existent.

So, does that mirror what I am learning from around the world? Are we on the brink of a world shortage of beef?

For the first time that I can recall, American beef producers last week almost knocked Scotland off its place of having the highest beef price in the world (after Japan).

The last week of May saw US beef farmers on the brink of 370p per kg – 12 months ago when we were there, it was 320pper kg, when we were at 333p per kg. How things have changed in a short period of time.

As my American friend said in his US twang: "Jim, at our age, we have seen it all before. It is a long time since we learnt we have to take the ups and downs in this farming business."

Last week-end I thought I was back in Kansas when I was the official judge at the East YFC stockjudging held at David Ismail's Aberdeen-Angus herd at Fordel.

David certainly has one of the best A-A herds I have ever seen. Uniformity they are of a size and shape which the market is crying out for – and will be much more so when we leave the EU and rid ourselves of this out-of-date EUROP grading system.

That leads me on to the failure of SAMW to grasp the challenge that AHDB England and Wales has alluded to by having a conference at Stratford-upon-Avon (on June 15) to explore the Meat Standards Australia programme.

The speakers were Sarah Strachan (MSA programme manager), Janine Lau (MSA research and development manager). In 2015/16, more than 3m carcases were graded under the MSA programme and delivered $Au153m in additional returns to Australian cattle producers.

Sarah and Janine discussed the MSA's eating quality grading system that has been in place since 1998 in Australia. They discussed why this was so important for Australia.

The audience heard how it had developed and the way that they measure predicted eating quality of every cut in the carcase. This has led to delivering significant value to the Australian industry. They covered four topics:

* Why and how was an eating quality grading system developed?

* What is measured in the grading system and why?

* How MSA has been implemented in Australia and the value it has delivered.

* The continuous improvement of the MSA programme.

It is more than 12 months – particularly since the Brexit vote – this column has been telling the four bodies in Scotland, if they do not get off their back-sides in this ever-competitive world, Scotch beef will be left at the starting gate after we leave the EU.

I have to congratulate AHDB in having the foresight to realise that after we leave the EU, they will be in a competitive market where quality matters and not just shape. Hence the reason why they are looking at what our competitors are doing.

That has been confirmed on many occasions by the numerous Nuffield scholars who have travelled the world and come back every time and tell this beef industry how far it is behind in recognising 'quality'. The kind of beef that has the customer coming back again and again.

Much as I would liked to have heard the two Aussies, we will be soaking up the sun in Italy attending the wedding of the daughter of our closest neighbours. I am sure this will be a little different from a traditional Scottish celebration.

Hopefully, Ryanair will have us back a few hours before the start of Scotland's greatest farming event at the Royal Highland Show, which this year hosts the World Aberdeen-Angus Forum. This is going to attract hundreds of Angus breeders from around the World and I am sure they will be looked after as well as we were in US a year ago!

By all accounts, Ingliston is going to be close to bursting at the seams with every sector having pretty near record entries, which can only be good for Scottish agriculture.

We just hope we have four days of the weather we enjoyed in May.

After hosting an Aberdonian group for a farm visit organised by Eddie Gillanders, on their way to the Scottish Beef Event, I decided to attend it on Thursday, at Earlston, in the Borders.

The Stewarts' three generations are doing an excellent job of running this large mixed farm.

Like everywhere else in Scotland it virtually poured all day. Fortunately – or maybe even because of it – it did not deter a large turnout of visitors who attended to listen, look, visit the many stands and probably most of all, converse with fellow beef farmers about the many aspects of our industry.

One question I did hear a few times was why does Douglas keep his excellent male Angus as bulls?

As usual, there was a full house to listen to the speakers at the seminar. Our farm minister, Fergus Ewing, gave a short opening address where he said all the things that politicians think we want to hear.

I wonder if it would have been any different the next day which was of course, after the election! I also wonder how many of us got that wrong? (Me included!)

It is stunning how fast this political game changes. I have to admit, if I had been Theresa May eight weeks ago, seeing how the situation looked, I would have done the same.

It was impossible to predict how wrong that decision was going to be at that time. David Cameron did the same for Brexit!

Donald Trump may have got it right but I do not know how he sleeps at night! I am sure Theresa May will have had a few sleepless nights too and I am afraid she does have my sympathy because I still think she is the best person in politics to lead our country through the unchartered waters that lie ahead.

Sadly, our country is in political shambles, but Mrs May has the largest majority of MPs, so we have to hope she can get the job done.

The star of the election has been Ruth Davidson, who brought the Conservatives in Scotland back to being a real force in our country which must now put any thought of another referendum way into the far distant future, if ever!