A farmyard is not a big driveway
The surface is often the same material, and that is where the similarity stops.
Farm concrete is usually older, laid thicker, and finished rougher, which is good news because it takes pressure without complaint. It also holds an organic film that a residential patio never develops: a mix of slurry, silage effluent, feed dust and the algae that grows on top of all of it. That film is soft, deep and biological rather than mineral, so it comes off readily but there is a great deal more of it than on a domestic job.
The other difference is scale. A double driveway is sixty square metres. A modest yard and apron is six hundred. That changes how the work is bought: nobody prices a farmyard by the square metre in the way a homeowner would want, because you are buying days on site.
What comes up well and what does not
Green and black organic growth on concrete comes off comprehensively. This is the bulk of most yards and the change is obvious.
Compacted muck in the corners and along wall junctions takes longer per square metre than anything else on the site. It is worth deciding at survey whether you want the corners done properly or want the open areas covered for the same money.
Rust bleeding from steel gates, feed barriers and machinery standing does not come out with water. Same as on an industrial site, that needs an acidic treatment and a separate conversation.
Old lime wash and flaking paint on block walls will come off in patches under pressure, which can look worse than leaving it. I will point this out before touching a wall rather than after.
The Weald and the water
Working across the Weald means a lot of holdings on heavy clay with yards that drain slowly and stay wet. Two practical consequences.
A yard on clay takes longer to dry, so plan the visit when the stock or the machinery can stay off it for a day rather than an hour.
And the ditch network on Wealden farms runs straight into watercourses, which is why the drainage question at survey is not a formality. Getting that wrong is a pollution incident, not a mess.
Booking and pricing
Agricultural work is priced by the day. A yard, an apron and a run of standing usually comes out at one or two days for a single operator, and the honest way to buy it is to walk the site with me and agree what gets done in that time rather than to specify an area.
Repeat work between seasons is cheaper per visit than a rescue clean after five years, for the same reason it is on every other surface: soft organic growth washes off, and the same growth left to consolidate for five winters does not.
Questions
Farms and agricultural: what buyers ask
When is the right time of year to book this?
Late winter into early spring for most holdings, or the quiet stretch after harvest. The yard is emptiest, the machinery is not moving through it constantly, and a clean apron going into spring stays clean longer than one done in October. I would avoid booking anything in the fortnight either side of your busiest period, whenever that falls for you.
Is this the same as a proper disinfection?
No, and the distinction matters. What I do is the wash: getting the muck, slurry film and organic growth off the concrete so a surface is actually clean. Disinfection with a DEFRA approved product for a livestock building is a separate discipline with its own record keeping, and it is not something I offer. Washing first is what makes any later disinfection work at all, since a disinfectant applied over organic matter is largely wasted.
Where does the washings water go on a farm?
This needs answering before I turn a tap. Yard washings containing slurry or manure are agricultural waste and cannot go to a watercourse or a soakaway. On most holdings the answer is the dirty water system or the slurry store, and the wash gets planned to fall that way. Where a clean area drains separately to a ditch, that area is washed with water only and nothing else.
Can you clean the barn itself, not just the floor?
I can wash down concrete panel walls, the lower part of block walls and hardstanding inside an open sided building. What I do not do is work at height, anything inside a sealed building with the machine running, or asbestos cement roofing of any kind. That last one is not caution, it is the law.
Arrange a survey
Tell me about the farms and agricultural
Rough area, surface type and the quietest window on your site is enough to start with. I will walk it before quoting, and put a fixed price in writing afterwards.
Sent
That is with me.
I read every one myself. If you sent photos I can usually come back with a fixed price the same day, or the next morning if it arrives late.