Been absent for a while

I’ve been away a while, but now I am back!

Look out for new posts coming soon and new skills. As well as a revamp of the blog, new pics, and new ideas.

Quick update: Ruby, the house cow, is milking well after calving 2 weeks ago. Last year she had twins so we had no milk, but we are waiting for the eventual beef.

Cheese and yogurt making are ‘in’ for 2012 in preparation for the next batch of school visits.  We had Labneh cheese for lunch and Greek yogurt for supper last night. The Greek yogurt was home made from a batch of yogurt which was then strained through a muslin, but for not as long as the Labneh cheese. The cheese also contained salt.

What on earth…..

What on earth is going on… this is a really shocking story from BBC Wales.

Click here to read about the slaughter of horned cows.

It is also reported here in the Daily Mail

We are not in a position to comment much except we are very shocked.

However, I should point out many farmers work with horned cattle safely on a daily basis and shooting loose cattle is very, very dangerous as the likelihood of stray bullets and an unclean kill requiring several shots and much suffering from the animal as well as the onlookers is incredibly high.

Only once or twice in a long lifetime of livestock farming have I seen a loose animal shot out of total necessity because it was maddened and very distressed.  And this was only after we had tried sedation and the vet first. It is totally different from destroying an animal which is contained and I feel it is a very irresponsible action to take.

One wonders what the risk assessment for this terrible action was?

Whatever the real problem was, and they may be more to it, we are all completely outraged and this was not the way to solve it.

Signs of spring

We have some unmistakable signs of spring:

longer days,

birds pairing off,

geese on the move – flying overhead in their V formations,

grass, weeds and clover growing in the pastures,

sap rising in the hedges and some are almost budding.

 

What a contrast to last year, and far too early as it is only mid-Feb and winter could easily return. Here’s hoping for a long mild spring,  which could lead to a good strong crop of young calves and lambs and even potentially a good harvest.

 

a funny farming face

FACE stands for farming and countryside education. It is an organisation which is passionate about educating children about food and farming.

They have enlisted the help of one of the UK’s funniest comedians, Bill Bailey,  and last summer they made a video to help get their message across. Enjoy.

We love the shorts and wellies!

Great food, sensible prices

Finally, we made it to the famous Little Chef at Popham.You can’t miss it as the sign is unique [see below].

Lunch on Monday was really great. Fantastic service and delicious food. It was a world away from so many roadside eateries, and the countless other mediocre meals served up daily in restaurants and pubs all over the country to the unsuspecting British public and tourists. I had the Coq au Vin with tasty and fluffy mashed potatoes and excellent peas.

A freshly cooked main course is served up for under a tennner and if all meals out were like this when we went out to eat life would be so very much better. As it is we frequently struggle to eat as well out as we do at home. Pubs and restaurants are rarely visited more than once, sometimes only twice.

Be assured Little Chef @ Popham, we will be back and we urge anyone who is passing westwards down the M3 and onto the A303 to stop for a meal. If you are keen to have a traditional LC fry up then you still can but I urge you to try a real meal from the menu. Next time I shall to try the signature dish. We did not try a pudding as we knew we’d be out again for a meal in the evening, but hope to next time.

The family will tell you what a very bad customer I can be when out for a meal but it is only because the food and service is often so lacking. The last previously good place we went to delivered a human hair under my salad… As I finished the salad I found the hair.. and no  I did not have pudding after that, you can imagine I did not feel like it.

Keep up the good work Popham LC and grateful thanks to Heston Blumenthal and Channel 4!

Happy Christmas

Happy Christmas to one and all.

Thanks for reading and following my blog. There will be more updates soon.

very agricultural prime time TV

We are not quite sure how this very agricultural advert got on primetime TV, but it is extremely popular with the farming fraternity who enjoy all the demo tractors, and the young farmers. Enjoy!

frosty web

come in to my parlour said the spider to the fly

the skating rink

The lanes around us have become skating rinks. No grit in sight.

We have asked the council for a stock of  grit and said we’d do the worst areas near to us, will see what  happens.

The water bowser is very busy as many of the troughs are now empty and not re-filling owing to the continues freeze. We also have to keep heaters on overnight to stop the bowser freezing up in the workshop.

Forecasters predict a slight thaw tomorrow, before returning to colder temperatures. We will see.

ice tinted glasses

Several things have upset me this morning.

Firstly, it appears that some people have complained to the media that they have NO SNOW! Well they should get real. For those who have to get out and work in all weathers outside, or who have a vital job to do and need to commute only to find that the roads are impassable, would not agree.

Secondly, this type of bad weather and freezing temperatures is, and always will be, dangerous and can kill.

We are not badly off here. It is not fun and it is still bitterly cold, and we have some snow, but I am pleased to report that we are not really struggling. Certainly it is a grind everyday to water everything outside, and inside, as the pipes inside some of the buildings are freezing up now.

Jethro is having to change his plans, and house more animals than originally thought this winter. The early cold snap has caught everyone out – it is not unreasonable to expect to keep cattle out in the fields until Christmas or just after.

The hardest part Jethro said over breakfast is that this is only the 2nd December and it was almost mid-April before temperatures rose this year and Spring arrived.  Memories of last winter’s struggles to feed and keep the livestock in good condition are too fresh in our minds and it saps the spirits somewhat to think that we may have many more months of cold weather.

Last night watching Edwardian Farm , as Jethro snored loudly on the sofa, there was something that Ruth said about  Christmas being a low-key event for rural dwellers.  She explained that in Edwardian times the big Christmases were mainly celebrated by the urban middle classes who had both time and money to spare. Country folk, she said, had neither the time  nor the money.

This to a certain extent still rings true in that all farmers who keep livestock have to feed and water and check their animals whatever day of the year it is. There may be a rota to share the workload over the holiday period, but if the weather is as bad as it was last Christmas then it becomes a two-man job anyway.

My experiences of farming Christmases have been mixed, some excellent and some we’d rather forget. And unsurprisingly it has usually been the weather that has made all the difference.  In the run up to the 25th December a lot of extra work and effort goes in to moving feedstuffs and bedding around to reduce the number of hours worked on two-day holiday.

On the day we have always had delicious fresh food to eat, a warm cosy fire to sit by, and of course a Christmas tree with a pile of presents to open. The difference between these good and the not so good days has been time. Enough time to enjoy the lunch, enough time to sit and enjoy the family opening presents, and any time at all to just have a rest.

Some Christmas Days have been rushed, the day itself or even the Christmas dinner has been interrupted by phone calls reporting trouble, or the farmer is just so exhausted from the extra work from the bad weather that he has his Christmas dinner late and then sleeps through everything else!

As you can guess I am not wishing for a white Christmas this year, we’ve all had quite enough of the white stuff already!

 

a you tube surprise

Just been sent this on email, it is marvellous so had to share it. It momentarily transports us from the struggles of keeping farm animals in icy temperatures.

ENJOY!

cheeky land girls

Cheeky land girls

Agricultural students at Newcastle University have produced a ‘naked calendar’ in support of the brain-injuries charity Headway – the brain association. Three photo shoots taken in very nippy conditions in the North Tyne and Newcastle area have produced an outstanding calendar with the gorgeous agricultural girls undoubtedly the cream of the crop, with the lads not far behind.

Twelve months ago Simon Hales, 21, a member of the Newcastle University Agricultural Society, was half way through his studying at Newcastle, when a serious accident resulted in Simon being in a coma for 5 weeks. He then spent the next 3 months in hospital, first in the Newcastle General Hospital where he was initially unable to speak or move and then he was transferred nearer home to the Leicester General Hospital, brain injuries unit. Now, one year into his recovery he is living in a specialist residential brain rehabilitation centre in Northamptonshire and recovering well. Simon’s good progress is a testament to his own courage and the unfailing support both he and the family have received from the health professionals and Headway.

Headway- the brain association, supports people with brain injuries along with their families and friends. The Newcastle students wish to support the charity and thank them for the help and support they continue to give to Simon and his family.  This fund-raising calendar is a real team effort with many of the student’s parents and some local businesses donating sponsorship money to cover the printing costs. The first print run for 500 calendars is already underway and orders can be dispatched in time for Christmas presents.

Calendars are £6 each or 2 for £10 with packing and postage £1.50 per calendar.

To order a calendar this can be done either by BACS transfer, or by post with a cheque for the full amount payable to Miss A Langmead.

If you wish to pay by BACS please contact Anna Langmead by email a.f.langmead@ncl.ac.uk with the number of calendars you’d like to buy and your full address and contact details.

If you wish to send a cheque please send this to Miss A Langmead, Stock House, Sturminster Newton, Dorset, DT10 2BG making sure you send the address where you’d like the calendars sent.

the agronomy breakfast club

Picture this. Another freezing morning, and another day of unfreezing water pipes with the forecasters predicting at least 10 days of similar weather. Oh the joys of keeping livestock in the winter!

After the first hour outside, feeding and watering animals, welcome bowls of hot porridge beckon with the all important mugs of tea in front of the rayburn and the first chance of the day to thaw out frozen fingers and thumbs. For some strange reason it is my thumbs that are playing cold and dead first this year.

Knowledge there is a plenty in this farming family and just as a spoonful of delicious porridge, mixed with farm produced honey, is to be eaten the contents of the spoon are examined by the qualified agronomist at the end of the table and the one darker grain sitting on my spoon amongst the creamy, steaming porridge is identified as an imposter.. not an oat but a cleaver, a weed seed. Cleavers are also known as sticky beak and they have very sticky eaves and small round sticky seeds.

Not deterred by less than 100% pure porridge oats I ate the offending seed, indeed I have eaten many before, but no one has ever turned breakfast into an agronomy lesson. For those who are wondering agronomy is the science of crops.

The next discussion was how batches of oats vary, from one bag or box to another as the porridge made yesterday was slightly runny compared to usual and exactly the same quantities were used. 1 to 3 oats to milk, or water as individual family members prefer. I prefer 100% milk to make mine, it lasts me longer right through to lunch. Jethro has just water in his batchbut has 2 bowls in the morning 2 hours apart.

We are having roast lamb with vegetables from the garden for lunch and I am just wondering what science lesson over lunch we may expect next.

PS This farm grew porridge oats for Mornflake last year as a break crop in the crop rotation on the arable land.

they shoot cows don’t they?

Not all of farming with animals is fun, sometimes it is tragic and very sad.

Recently we were called out to assess a poorly cow out in the field, all we knew was that she was lying down. This is known as a ‘downer’ cow. When we reached her we could see that she was in great pain and distress and immediately called on our many years of observation and experience to try to determine the cause of her troubles and if we should try to move her, or send for the vet.

In less than a minute we noted that she was in pain, and dehydrated – the latter possibly from being unable to get up to seek water. She was lying on her left side, and on close examination we could see that her right pelvic joint looked normal and the left one did not, in fact it looked very strange indeed, with only a very sharp and pointed piece of bone sticking up and there was nothing at all where the top of the femur should have been. We knew straightaway not to move her and summoned the vet, who as it happened was only half an hour away. Mobile phones make this so much easier and quicker. We also fetched her some water, which she drank, and we wafted the flies away from her eyes and stroked her to keep her calm as we waited for expert medical help.

The vet agreed that the pelvis looked horribly wrong and only under his strict instructions was she was moved by four men onto her right side in order for him to examine the pelvis internally. The diagnosis was that she had either a dislocated or broken pelvis and she was immediately and humanely destroyed.

The cow’s name was  Elderflower and she was six years old and due to calve next month. Tears pricked my eyes, but I had to appear resolute, that is the nature of farming, but sometimes the reality gets to one and it got to me that day, and I learned after we  got home that I was not the only one.

Slips, trips and broken hips is a health department campaign to prevent falls in the elderly, unfortunately there was nothing we could have done to help Elderflower. We tracked back through the grass trails she had made while trying to get up. We found whereabouts on the chalky  hill where she had slipped coming down a steeper part, caught her foot, tripped and gone down with this traumatic injury.

An injury like this in the field is a very rare occurrence, but a very sad one, we were pleased to be able to help her so quickly, and also that we knew what was wrong. The loss of her calf as well was hard to bear, but the vet assured us that in the womb the calf is unconscious, and it was too soon to try a caesarean, which actually would have provoked further suffering for the cow. There is an old saying in farming:  “the first loss is the least loss” and in this case it was true.

sloe beef

We sent a bullock away this morning to the abattoir, sold to the local butcher, and on the way back to the field the remaining beef cattle stopped and gorged themselves on sloe berries. It was really hard to persuade them to move the final 20 yards to the field.

It sounds lovely, the cattle foraging on autumn berries, however as sloes grow on blackthorn there is a darker side to this tale. If you look carefully in the picture it is possible to see the blackthorns sticking out amongst the berries.

Berries and thorns

Many thanks to http://www.englishcountrywalks.com for their excellent photograph which illustrates today’s blog.

Two years ago, over a period of two months, we had three cattle go down with a very rare illness – woodentongue. It is easily treated with antibiotics and caused when a particular strain of bacterium enters the mouth causing the tongue to swell and harden just like wood. If affected, the cattle are in great pain, have difficulty eating and drinking, and lose condition rapidly.  If not spotted quickly it can easily become fatal.

I was lucky in a way as I had come across it once before. When the second and third cases appeared, a few days apart, about six weeks after the first case, I did contact the vet and we agreed he should come if we had a fourth case, as this was right at the heart of the bluetongue epidemic.

The vet said how rare woodentongue was and he acknowledged and accepted that I had both seen and treated it once before.  The administration of 5 days of antibiotics did the trick, and now we must be extra vigilant watching this batch of almost finished cattle carefully and look out for any drooling or dribbling which are the first signs of trouble.

Last time we identified the cause to a particularly prickly hedge in a different field and we moved the cattle. It will be a pity if any of them have pricked their tongues this morning as they are a good crop of cattle should all be ready and away by Christmas.

Farmers are skilled in animal husbandry and often have years of experience in treating and diagnosing ailments and illnesses.  It is for this reason that this article makes good reading. There has been some suggestion that farmers be downgraded to members of the public when it comes to advertising and antibiotics.

We do use antibiotics, but only when absolutely necessary, as in the cases described above, and always discuss veterinary matters with our excellent vet. He then helps us to decide what medicines to keep on the farm, however it is helpful for us as professional livestock keepers to have additional facts available from the companies and reps which help us to ask more questions when talking to the vet.

simple pleasures

a lifelong ambition achieved

It may be an old cliché but sometimes it is truly the simplest things in life that give most pleasure.  Jethro has achieved one of his lifelong ambitions – to grow good cauliflowers in the garden at home.

They look good and taste good, and we have had so many that despite eating lots, and giving some away, for the first time we have tried freezing them. Lots of blanching took place yesterday and we will see in the winter if it paid off.

The success of these cauliflowers has actually given him more satisfaction than the two thousand tonnes of arable crops that he has grown at the same time. It was also a lot less stressful.

Jethro recommends black matting for weed prevention, and netting to keep the pigeons off.  Nature and one application of an insecticide for caterpillars in July did the rest. We try to be as organic as possible in the vegetable garden but  find the Brassicas always have to have one treatment to prevent annihilation from cabbage whites.

Since 6th August, when we set up the new rain gauge, we have had five and a half inches of rain and everything has had a good soaking and there will be no residues left on the vegetables. The dry spell is over.

On the farm and in the veg garden we now have grass and weeds almost up to our knees. What a difference the summer rain makes! As our annual rainfall is only in the region of 23 inches it is remarkable to get almost 20% of the annual total in what is normally the driest month.

There is no telling what the autumn and winter will be like, but we are no longer short of grass for forage and Jethro has bought in hay, at a good price,  to compensate for what we could not make. Like all past winters it will get over and I have to say at my stage of life the years seem to pass quicker and quicker I can hardly believe we are heading towards the last night of the Proms again….

I have a question: why do summers seem to pass so fast and winters go so slowly?

more than an inch of rain

An inch of rain overnight, and even more rain today, has brought the 2010 harvest to an abrupt halt, and ceased the previous worries of winter grass stocks, although forage stocks will remain short.  Since it started raining a couple of weeks ago the grass in the fields has gone mad, and as no-one has time to cut the farmhouse lawns, they look as if they need grazing by 20 sheep right now!

Undaunted by last week’s experiences, I am venturing off to view 4 more ponies tomorrow, and hoping for dry weather or else it could become a bit steamy in the car. At least two changes of clothing will be required, and a toothbrush, just in case, we accidentally get flooded somewhere although I do hope to be home again by nightfall.

Then back to work sorting of the fat lambs on Wednesday and hopefully off to market to sell them the old-fashioned way on Thursday.

horsey people

What is it with horsey people?

I have recently shaken hands on a deal to buy a new steed, paid a cash deposit of 4%, and summoned the vet to check the animal over. The night before the vet was due, a message was left on my phone to say we are now not selling! I am amazed in these difficult financial times, with horses slow to sell and a severe shortage of hay, and I was led to believe a new pony was waiting in the wings.

I now await the return of my deposit. Watch this space.

Edit: A cheque has arrived and been paid straight into the bank….. I will check the balance in a few days

2nd Edit: Thankfully the cheque cleared, and I have now found another possible pony from a reputable home, and will be booking the vet. The funny thing is that we do think this gelding will be even better than the original one and is cheaper. Funny how these things happen although it doesn’t always seem like it at the time.

Allegiance has changed..

I wished I had my camera in the bathroom last night. No, this is not something kinky, just another snapshot of rural life.

I looked out of the window to see a scene reminiscent of a much-loved traditional children’s book..

Except Mr McGregor [aka Jethro] did not carry a spade but a loaded shotgun.  Something has been eating our brassica seedlings planted in July, but we did not know what. Then a single rabbit was spotted inside the garden, which was problematic as we have fixed rabbit fencing on three sides of the garden, and electric rabbit netting on the fourth side. The netting is taken down periodically to allow access for cultivation with large-scale agricultural machinery to ease the workload of seasonal digging.

The rabbit hid amongst the three rows of potatoes and Jethro strode through the long green tops, gun in hand, seriously intent on killing the intruder. Two shots were fired and the rabbit ran, first to the right then to the left, eventually with both barrels fired, for a second time, at his rear end he shot out under the electric fence [I think he has used this route before] and vanished into the countryside beyond.

The electric fence has been re-checked and firmly pegged down, and we hope this bunny got the message.

As a boy Jethro loved the story of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter, however as a keen vegetable grower and farmer if rabbits cause him a problem they become public enemy No 1.

How times have changed.

the dry spell [part ll]

I have only heard of one farm which has made a similar quantity of hay to last year. Every other farmer we have spoken to is down by an average of 50% yield. We are down on silage by the same despite being inventive with what and where to cut. As yet we have no hay made as our Stewardship agreements do not allow cutting before 15th July and since that date we have been making silage and combining the oil seed rape.

This dire set of circumstances, on top of the continued lack of summer grazing, is potentially catastrophic, not just for farmers, but for the horse industry too. Small bale hay is already up to £7.00 per bale in some parts, what might the price next February, especially if the weather was bad? Animal welfare could become quite an issue for anyone not prepared to plan ahead and if need be pay up to ensure enough stocks. Last winter my horse ate one whole bale a day through the worst weather and even I need to stock up again. What hay we make here isn’t always good enough quality for horses and even I have to buy from another farmer. Jethro now owes me 31 good bales of best horse hay. I bought them at £3.00 per bale and the same bales from the same farm are now £6.00 per bale. It is not the money I want but the exact replacement of my goods. Could this be contentious issue, I do hope not!

Jethro is planning to ammonia treat all his straw from the arable crops to feed the cattle and bulk up what hay and silage we do have.

A lot now depends on what kind of autumn the whole country has, how much rain, and whether we get a prolonged flush of autumn grass.

Rain dance anyone? Yes please, but not until after the wheat is harvested!

all go as usual

There is never a slack time on a farm, especially a mixed farm but lately we seem to be either very busy all the time or as we are currently FLAT OUT.. I expect this will last for several weeks as we have a lot of silage and hay to make, and the wheat fields will be ready to harvest in about 10 days also.

It is a pity really as I feel I need a break.. perhaps a break will only occur in my dreams and actually a restful night at my age would probably do me more good. I have had a lot of busy dreams lately and wake up almost too tired to want to get up. It is a tough life being the ‘mother of agriculture’, I feel I have been farming for centuries.

We are still combining oil seed rape [canola], and also making silage. There are tractors and trailers going all hours in and out of the yards bringing back either the seeds or bales. The seeds are tipped in the grain store, and the bales are wrapped in plastic and stacked ready for use in the winter.

The sow who was so ill with metritis yesterday  has had a remarkable recovery and may not now be able to finish her course of antibiotics. This is not at all good from a veterinary point of view, something Jethro is  so meticulous about, however she has become VERY aggressive towards ANYONE who enters her living quarters we may have no other option, if we wish to stay in one piece, but to not finish the course of injections.

Meanwhile the boar seems very content, after his excitement yesterday, I wonder why!

unexpected consequences

Everything is happening today: silage making in big bales, combining previously swathed oil seed rape [ canola], and then the vet was required.

A pig was ill and not responding to the treatment we gave her, the milking cow had a discharge from her rear end that needed investigating, and a boar needed his feet trimming.

The first two were straightforward, the vet diagnosed metritis – infection of the womb – and has changed the antibiotic to a stronger one than the one we gave last night. We have also given something to reduce fever and make her feel better, the piggy equivalent of ibuprofen. The pig only farrowed on Monday night, and we thought she’d passed all the afterbirth, so this infection has struck very quick. The sow will not even eat fresh carrot tops from the garden and this particular pig is not known for her fastidiousness! Still hopefully by tomorrow she will have turned the corner and do her 8 piglets well.

Following internal examination the cow was deemed to be ok , with a normal if slightly heavy discharge following parturition [ birth] 11 days ago. A good result.

The boar was a completely different matter. The vet sedated him on arrival, so the drug would have time to work while we did the other jobs. He was a bit sleepy but not out cold.  Stressnil was used. Jethro tickled the pig behind his ear until he lay down, then he rubbed the boars tummy while the vet started to trim the feet. All went well for a while then the boar suddenly became very lively and all at once it dawned on us that he was actually extremely aroused and as he weighs in excess of 380kg this could be somewhat dangerous. After the boar made several clear advances towards Jethro we all had to dash for the exit, however the vet and I were so convulsed with laughter that we escaped and left all the equipment in the pen. We eventually bribed the boar away from the box with food to retrieve the instruments and had to decide to call it a day.

Methinks Jethro will never quite live this one down!

healthchecks really do save lives

I had been going to  tell you about the industrial quantities of Savlon healing gel [we’d run out of the traditional Savlon cream] used by yours truly over the last few days to fight off the unpleasant and lumpy infection that was brewing on my shin post wasps.. but after using almost a tube of gel it is so much better and I have decided to say something else.

We received a phone call today – a friend of ours has quite simply had his life saved by a BUPA health check, and the subsequent medical care. It has surely been the best money he has ever spent. We wish him a very speedy recovery and look forward to seeing him soon.

wasps and wellies don’t go

After supper last night Jethro wanted help with a newly calved cow with mastitis. I went  to help and was letting the calf suckle the two front teats, but stopping him from suckling the rear two teats as they had been treated with antibiotic cream. While I watched the calf, Jethro was setting up a gate in the corner to pen the calf overnight after he’d had his fill so that he would not ingest the anti-biotic cream.

Suddenly I felt a needle like sensation in the back of my leg and another, and another. I yelped and danced trying to kick off my wellie as fast as I could. At this point the cow, normally placid, decided I was a threat to her new baby [born on Friday ] so she put her head down, complete with horns and charged me.. I yelled some more and while still on one leg ducked away from her line of fire, Jethro dropped the gate he was fixing and batted her on the nose…

Not sure what health and safety would have made of the goings on but eventually I got the gate open and hopped out in one Wellington boot to safety and spent the rest of the evening stinking of vinegar with several ice packs and an anti-histamine tablet. Jethro sorted out the cow and calf and they spent a quiet night and he let the calf out to suckle again this morning. I have stuck blobs of  Savlon on dressings on the afflicted parts to prevent infection, and we carry on.

I do keep repeating this… never work with animals.. but as far as I am aware a wasp is an insect and I never planned to work with these.

the dry spell

This hot dry spell goes on and on. The only real rain we have had since March is a few showers in early April and June. Much as we love the warmth and the fact  that we don’t need coat, sweater or brolly it is beginning to cause Jethro a few problems.

June and July is traditionally hay and silage time, when we cut and bale forage crops for winter feeding to the cattle and sheep. A lot of our land is in stewardship to protect the flora and fauna so we cannot mow this land until after 15th July, which produces a stalkier and less nourishing feed. In the mean time we have been cutting grass where ever we can, and the yields are so low that the costs are much higher we are using a lot of diesel and labour to get what we can. We are not alone, I heard of a farmer in the New Forest last night, which is currently even drier than we are, who made the grand total of 150 bales of hay in a field he expects to get 1200 from in a normal year. One of our fields gave 22 rounds bales of silage last year and only 11 this year. At least we have plenty of acres and plenty of grazing at present, again we know some farms are already on winter rations.

Last week, for the first time, we cut around the perimeter of the wheat fields and made ‘whole crop’ silage as this is a very environmentally friendly method of weed control for brome and blackgrass whilst also creating a basking area for the birds. The field margins of either 4 or 6 metres remain untouched again preserving the flora and fauna.

Jethro feels like the Chancellor, he is making cuts and savings wherever he can, and the season is so challenging he is making new policies all the time, usually at the breakfast table. Yet despite the efforts of everyone it will still be a tight winter and in the best interest of all the animals a nutritionist has been called in to balance our winter rations to ensure we maintain optimum growth in the youngstock and maintenance for the adult stock as last winter was very hard on them with the intense cold and so much snow and frost. He will analyse the forage crops for dry matter and protein and create a feed ration with our available arable crops: beans wheat, barley and oats and then send a mixer waggon to make up these rations every month. The cost to us over the raw materials which we grow is £20.00 per tonne, plus any additional mineral or ingredients that we may need. We will do this for all the stock: cattle, sheep and pigs.

It certainly offers us peace of mind and regular weighing every month of the youngstock will give good indications of the effectiveness of this new policy, hopefully leading to better returns of increased weight gain, and growth rates. We are an old-fashioned extensive mixed farming system, and our animals are mainly grass reared but in a season like this the very best of modern science needs to be applied.

In the meantime on with the mowing and the baling.

the little red book

In my possession is a little red book. It has been in the family for a long, long time. The first edition was printed in 1885, my copy in the eighth edition and appears to date from the 1890’s.

It is called Everyday Farriery by Day and Sons, Crewe. It is a veterinary book that covers the everyday diseases of horses, cattle, sheep and pigs.

Every so often I take it out of the bookshelves and study it. Tucked inside the first leaves of the book are various items.

1)A letter from one Land Agent to another  with a mash recipe for cows.

“1 teaspoonful of carbolic acid in one ounce of water mixed in a mash and given to a cow in calf once a week – is the receipt you want. The mash must be well mixed and care taken to give each cow its own mash separately if you are dosing several cows,

yours sincerely..”

2) Other carefully saved clippings tucked away in the back page are cut from the Farmer and Stockbreeder newspaper with cures for Milk Fever, and Anthrax and Blackleg.

We have no idea what this mash mix was for, or even if it worked. My father gave me the book many years ago and I often read it as some things in veterinary medicine has not changed at all, and other things have changed a lot.

This little tome was not just about giving information though, it was also a sales catalogue as many of the cures involved using products made by Day and Sons. Their “Black Drink” is mentioned throughout the book but there is no clue as to what ingredients this actually contained, although it appears to be advertised as a panacea for many livestock ailments.

What fascinates me so much is how farming and animal husbandry does not change. The challenges faced by today’s livestock keepers remain the same. The farmer who originally owned this book faced exactly the same challenges in the 1890’s as Jethro does today. The original farmer would have had more labour but the issues of feed, health, weather and profit remain the same. Science and technology have moved on providing deeper veterinary knowledge and medicines and modern machines, but essentially a livestock farmers job remains the same as it has done for centuries.

I like the continuity of this, this finite thread that links each and every generation to the land.

a moment’s pause for the Japanese livestock farmers

Living in the farming bubble, at busy times like right now, as we prepare for our annual open day, often means the world’s affairs pass one by.

I am therefore truly horrified to suddenly discover that Japan is the midst of a deepening foot and mouth crisis with the total numbers of animals slaughtered and to be slaughtered rising almost hourly. Instantly, I feel sick and very sorry for everyone involved as we in the British farming industry lived through all this in 2001 and again in 2007. It was a very close call in 2001 and it still makes us shake to remember the terror and the stress.

I send my good wishes to the farmers and pray for common sense to those in charge. Modern technology has given us accurate test kits and modern veterinary medicine has created vaccine. They need to test accurately, ring-fence with vaccine and only kill where they have too.  Indiscriminate slaughter, as we found out in 2001, does no one any good least of all farmers and their animals. Rare breeds and specialised genetics are all under threat, and this wholesale killing policy is not necessary. We would fight tooth and nail to protect our rare breeds..  I just hope we don’t ever have to.

Good information can be found here. Mary at Warmwell does a brilliant job keeping us all informed I just haven’t had time to read it for ages.

I send my support to the Japanese farmers and livestock keepers, it is tragic and we shall have to await the outcome and assess the long-term consequences on their livestock industry. There will, I am sure, be lessons for all of us from this sorry saga.

please go visit a farm this Sunday

Please go to the OPEN FARM SUNDAY website and type in your postcode. Look for a farm near you and go for a visit.

Hope you enjoy this FARMERS WEEKLY film** and I hope it will make you want to go and visit a farm on Sunday.

Have a great weekend.

** Please click on the Farmers Weekly link to the film as I could not get the video to embed properly at all and it is really worth watching, the music is great too.  Well done Farmers Weekly!!

lost for words

Today, I am lost for words.

This morning the postie brought a large A4 envelope full of thank you letters from a group of school children from London. In the last week we have hosted several visits of primary schoolchildren, one class at a time, each for a day’s visit. These letters are the first to arrive.

The bus arrives and the children disembark all of a chatter and then mostly queue up to use our one loo [we are a working farm, not a visitor centre], then we all set off on a farm walk to see all sorts of things – above and below ground, living and dead. This takes a good hour and involves a lot of running up and down hills, a wonderful stream of non-stop questions, and quite a lot of screaming. On the way back from visiting the outdoor pigs we stop and feed the 4-year-old pet sheep [who really loves all these extra meals] and then everybody has to wash their hands thoroughly before lunch.

Lunch is inside for the children, while we take a short break too. I try to grab something to eat, and catch up on phone messages.  After the children have eaten their lunch there is more play for them, weather permitting, outside on a large patch of clean and cut grass. After playtime and more hand washing, a variety of activities take place including holding pet lambs, feeding rams and cattle, and after further supervised hand washing, the serious art of milling & bread making is demonstrated where everyone gets a chance to first knead, and then shape the dough. Unfortunately we are not yet able to bake their dough pieces to take home but we are working on this as our next capital project.

Handmade by our visitors

It is exhausting and exhilarating all at the same time. The more visits we do the more refined our programme and delivery becomes and we get more relaxed, until the teacher in charge wants to leave early on account of the potential traffic problems and then we wonder how to fit everything in.

I need eyes in the back of my head and a very large cup of tea afterwards, but I love it. Jethro does too. The farm receives a small payment from Natural England to host one of these visits, and it has to be mentioned that this fee no longer covers the cost of our time and materials. However, the money is not why we do these visits, we passionately believe that everyone should learn about the countryside and how and where their food is produced. These children were both very interesting to be with and very interested in everything on the farm, and although lively were no trouble and perhaps easier to deal with than some schools we’ve had whose children perhaps have had more access to the countryside.

This brings me back to the letters: we understood that the majority of the children who came live in small flats in tall blocks in London and they have written the most entertaining letters mentioning most the animals we saw and fed including a goat, that we do not actually have, which is slightly puzzling [perhaps it was the pet sheep] and as you can imagine the dead rabbit and bones feature quite heavily amongst all the beautifully pencilled prose.

However, several children stated how much they had enjoyed coming to the farm and that it was the very best day of their lives, EVER , and this startling fact leaves us simply stunned.  Several actually put into words that they hope that we can get other children to come for this ‘very marvellous day’ and that we will continue to offer these visits.

We are now very determined to try to find additional funding sources to pay for the transport from London so more children can actually come. Based on our fairly limited experience of hosting school groups we believe it is the city children that need these visits most, although in an ideal world all primary school children should be able to visit a working farm.

The collective joy of running [and screaming as loud as you can] down a steep hill together, the finding of ‘booty’ [bones, stones, feathers, wool, straw, and all sorts of other interesting rural items…] to take back to school.                   The understanding that wheat grown on this farm made some of their lunchtime sandwiches – from various branded loaves of bread found on the supermarket shelf.

We believe this type of experience for many of these children is almost priceless and very important to their personal development and we seriously want to try to find financial help and support to cover the transport costs to get the children here so we are able to do more of this. We now know that once they are here we can give them a really interesting time, hopefully with happy memories that may truly last them all their lives.  Honestly, the effect of these farm visits on these children has been a revelation for us all here on the farm and made us all look at what we do everyday with fresh eyes.

All suggestions as to how we may achieve our funding aims are most welcome.

today

I like this story… and I hope you do too.

‘reality farming’

Is this a good idea? We received an email today with the following attachment which I am pasting below:

ALWAYS WANTED TO RUN A FARM?
Are you sick of the rat race? Wish your life was more “Good Life” than “This Life”?
Is a day on the allotment your idea of heaven? Think you can run your own business?
BBC is looking for ten couples to take part in a new series which will really put your
aptitude for farming to the test. Over six weeks you’ll learn how to run and manage
your own farm; from animal husbandry and harvesting, to coping with the
unpredictable British weather.
The series will culminate in the winning pair getting the opportunity to live and work
on their own small farm.
Whatever your background or relationship; friends / married / siblings, as long as you
both share that yearning for a life on the farm we want to hear from you.
To apply, please email your name to farm@splashmediatv.co.uk and an application
form will be emailed to you.
Successful candidates may spend up to six weeks away from home in summer 2010.

Is this trivialising the skills of those that farm the land or is it a good thing? I can’t help but wonder if in this case a little knowledge will prove dangerous, only time will tell.

My reservations are that 6 weeks is not enough, and it does not make clear what sort of farming it is or where. Is this for the good of the industry, the animals involved or even the participants?

There is a picture of a Hereford cross Simmental cow and a sheep grazing on the advertisement [only the sheep’s body showed so I couldn’t tell what breed apart from it is white so perhaps a Texel cross] but the picture cannot be linked here.

I wonder what angle the production company are coming at this from?  Please feel free to comment.

12 hours

What a difference 12 hours makes. Yesterday from 4 – 5pm in the evening sunshine I was raking horse droppings in the two acre paddock with the garden rake while Swift is away for 6 weeks.

This gives the weather and the birds and insects [ hopefully] a chance to disperse the muck and improve the grazing. It is also good therapy for my ankle and other muscles which have become rather inactive over the last 10 weeks.

Then this morning we awoke to heavy snow [none was forecast] and now have 5 inches. I only managed to rake a third of the field and had planned to chip away at the rest this week. The two sheep who live in the field are totally fed up and had to be cajoled to come for their barley, in the end I had to walk right across the field to give it to them, wisely they were staying put behind the hedge for shelter. The two collie dogs complained loudly being left firmly on the other side the gate and were desperate to attract my attention and help with  my task, but they did stay when told and were rewarded with a big fuss on my return.

boots and balls

The vet is here today, castrating bull calves to turn them into steers for fattening. None of this year’s crop of male calves are good enough to leave entire to grow on for a pedigree bull. This annual task was supposed to happen 2 weeks ago but the original visit ended in disaster on a previously icy morning with the vet thankfully ok, but the practice car in pieces, after a close encounter with black ice.

The sheepdogs have just been given their annual booster vaccination as our farm collies are not regularly taken to the vet’s surgery. In order to get an experienced large animal vet the surgery we use is a good way from here, and the farm dogs are so unused to civilisation that sitting in the waiting room is something we avoid unelss it is an emergency. Firstly, they are always very muddy which is not good for the car on the way there or the waiting room floor and leaves an emabarrasing trail of mud and sometimes muck.  Secondly, they either try to round everything up in the waiting room or in the case of our old girl pick a fight with the nearest dog to her. We worked out years ago that it is much better to get their jabs done in conjunction with a farm visit. Our oldest faithful collie who will be 14 years old later this year has today been diagnosed with a grade II heart murmur.  She is already retired from sheep work and yet is still active enough to chase car wheels. Until today we always thought she’d eventually kill herself under a vehicle, as we have never been able to cure her off the habit and as she ages the habit unfortunately worsens.  Today it seems as if nature may eventually intervene. The advice is to pass the stethoscope under her ribs every time we have a one of the vet’s out for something else and that way we can monitor if she is worsening, even if there are no obvious symptoms.  Certainly she shows no signs of ailing even after a good walk. The vet also microchipped the newer and younger collie in case she ever goes missing.

We long for spring. We awoke to yet more snow today, and there is no sign of the grass growing yet. We are still feeding all the outside stock and the heavy workload remains relentless.

Swift has gone away this week on a short working holiday in order I hope to come back ready for farmwork once I am sound enough on my ankle. He had not left his field in over 9 weeks except to have his feet trimmed, and as I am not yet 100% fit [currently around 80% is my guess] we decided this was the best way to get normal service going again.  I could tell he was becoming bored, and yet I believe the rest has done him good too. He has settled well in his new temporary home, the first email said that on his first ride out he coped with builders, electric drills and barking dogs, mnnn that’s sounds just like my little horse, which is why I chose him in the first place. I  keep being asked how I found him, he is collecting quite a fan club. Or perhaps he chose me? Amazingly, I was the first to see him on the internet, first to ring up, first to view and ride and made an offer on the spot. Collected him 2 days later.

I am off to buy some boots later today from a local stockist, where I can actually try them on, which are good for riding in with a recovering ankle. I hope to start riding a friend’s pony from next week to see how it is and work my way back to normal fitness, but without the hassle of starting a youngster [however good he may seem] off again.

Roll on spring, we need some sunshine to blow away the last of our lingering winter blues.

a bit of Brit grit

Keeping calm and carrying on is what the British farmers do best and the current winter remains no exception.

Earlier this week we discovered the council’s salt shortage has reached our locality with the big hill in and out of the village temporarily renamed the Cresta run. Yesteday we had thick fog and rain, pouring gutters  and huge puddles on top of the ice and Jethro may by the weekend  have to swop his crampons [currently attached to his wellies] for flippers.

The daily round of fresh food and water to every animal continues and there are almost 1000 head of different livestock to see to.

The business side carries on too with tonnes of grain collected yesterday for sale but after the second lorry got stuck and had to be pulled out by a tractor, all further collections have been cancelled by Jethro while we have this thick, thick ice.

Finally tonight we have running water for the pigs and for the first time in ages have not had to take the water bowser out to them. It will make the weekend duties easier and hopefully next week we can go back to selling some lambs and pigs as we have orders waiting for them.

The icy conditions made it impossible on welfare grounds  for both animals and staff to move them to sort out the best ones. The sheepdogs have just had normal walks to keep them cheery as running full tilt around an icy field to get the sheep in was too dangerous and crossing the road with these lambs on a stretch that was too slippery for people to stand on was not on either.

Roll on normal service, until the next storm comes.. winter has a long way to go yet… and yet I dream of spring already.

the nation feels the strain

It is not just the farmers that are feeling the strain. The whole nation appears to be ice bound.. see this picture … However the good news is that the farmers have actually been mentioned on sky news albeit in terms of a potential milk shortage as some milk tankers can’t get through. At the end of the TV news story the work the farmers do was actually mentioned in a positive way. Hooray!

We have snow flurries and increased wind which is now starting to move the existing snow in little bursts across the fields. Not a good sign.

I grew up under the tutelage of a mother with a siege mentality over kitchen supplies, and this has rubbed off on to me to a certain extent.  It is useful, but even in the 80’s we all kept much bigger supplies than we do now.

This arctic interlude [it has gone on far too long to call a snap] may change the nations shopping habits for a while as the memory of this will linger for quite a while and may become the stuff of legends as the 1947 storm did.

One late and dear farmer friend had two daughters, one born in the storm of 1947, and the other in the storm of 1963. ” That’s it” he was heard to say ” I’m having no more daughters”, tragically all the people in this story are gone now and yet the memory of the story of their births and his absolute delight in their safe arrival lingers, even now.

What tales will eventually be told of this meteorological challenge that has affected Britain?

In ‘blogland’ they can be told immediately and also very widely read. In the earlier mentioned storms it took weeks and weeks before any stories could be told. Telephones were still not common in 1947 in rural areas and there were not any gatherings at the markets because everyone was stuck.  What I remember from the tales of ’47 is the depth of the snow, frequently up to telegraph pole height. Tunnels were dug from farm houses to the buildings to see to the livestock. Somehow the weeks from January to March were endured and the stories have lasted too for two generations.

I had often thought that a similar scenario in the 21st Century would be easier to cope with on account of modern machinery and technology and yet I think the pictures on the news from 1963 look remarkably similar to the pictures of 2010.

We do however have the 24 hr TV news so long as we have electricity. I do feel for those enduring long power cuts as I once lived at a farm where the power went off several times every winter, sometimes for days [in those days we had an Aga and open fires in every room] and I still keep a cellar full of gas lamps, just in case.

mulepower

A printed version of THIS ARTICLE has been kicking around on my desk for ages. I am having a major tidy and sort and after putting the magazine [The Furrow] into the recycling box I have found an electronic version for you to read, and another You tube video to watch.

Some things in farming change a lot and some things never change. This is the modern equivalent  of the mule combine, and costs at least as much as much as a decent house.

about the video

Following one of my regular readers suggestions I have investigated this blog. It will give you further information about the ‘Bank Aid’ video I posted yesterday.

We have snow but not as much as some parts of the UK but enough to cause major disruption on the farm.

you have to see this

This just arrived by email.. a real tonic and the singing is possibly even worse than Jethro in the shower. I have only stopped laughing long enough to post on here, enjoy and Happy New Year.

hay ho

It is a bit embarrasing to admit this, as we are professional livestock farmers, but I have had to buy in some extra hay for Swift on account of the terrible weather. The big bale of hay we are currently using is too coarse and not very palatable and I was becoming concerned that Swift was not getting enough to eat in this very hard weather, as he kept leaving a lot of the hay that was put out for him. A very kind friend with horses of her own collected some small  bales yesterday from one of our local farming friends who makes good horse hay every year in June and sells a lot of hay to all the horsey folk. He will no doubt dine out on the fact that he sold hay to me too.. not very good for our credibility, however under the Stewardship Scheme we are tied into we are not allowed to cut hay or silage until after 15th July and this is not very good for horses as it is not as nourishing.

Jethro has kindly put up a hay rack on the fence so that my top notch hay will not be gobbled up by his erstwhile companions [sheep] in the field and I can also see now Swift happily munching his hay from the office window. This pleases me enormously as I feel very stuck in the house and cut off from my normally very active life.

Swift is the boss of his field and up to now any eating of ‘his’ hay could only be done when he isn’t looking or grazing, at least in the rack it will be there for him whenever he feels the need to eat. It makes me feel a whole lot better too because until I had the fracture I was bringing him in for extra hay most days to be sure he had enough and to keep handling him often as he is only young. This way I feel better knowing that he is now getting as much as he wants of the ‘good stuff’. At approx £1 a day that must be worth it for his wellbeing and my peace of mind. I am calculating 1/3 bale a day but Jethro will keep me posted on actually how much we do use, and it will depend on how much snow and frost we have..

Horses eat for about 20 – 22 hours a day. Their stomachs are small, about a 1.5 kilo capacity for feed, and their whole digestive systems are are designed for continous eating, yet as a prey animal they maintain the ability to flee at speed if danger arises and their guts fit in with this. This is completely different to a sheep or a cow who have a rumen. The rumen acts as a store for food and also in this bad weather as a central heating boiler. Swift seems warm enough in his thick quilted rug which reaches from his ears to his tail. As a Quarter Horse  cross Appaloosa he does not grow a thick woolly coat like New Forest ponies do. He has also lived outdoors for all of his life and until this year he lived in Scotland, first near Aberdeen and then in Dumfries, and he will certainly have experienced hard winters before.

something to cheer us

This is to cheer us through the chill and help us think of warmer climes

planning for next winter

The house is gradually emptying as the young generation go back to Uni and prepare for work on Monday.

The deep overnight frost has led to Jethro carting water out again to the pigs’ frozen water troughs. Tomorrow, he will move some huge storage tanks down there from another farm as it is already looking like a long fierce winter and this will save both time and effort.

The pigs are happy enough in their warm arks but the pig keepers’ are finding it a huge struggle to cope with a very wet and very cold winter so plans are already being made for bringing all the pigs into the sheds, and stables for the worst 4  months of winter from next year.  Another pig farm brings their pigs  in every winter and it seems to work well. Of course this action plan will almost guarantee a mild winter.

The pigs don’t mind the deep mud at all but it is extremely treacherous for the man with the bucket to wade through deep mud twice per day while a batch of pigs are pushing at him to get at the food and the dangers of ending face down either in cold thick mud, or on hard frozen ground [as per today] are all too real.

Funny how talk of global warming has ceased ever since the powers that be met in Copenhagen for their talks. You’d have thought they’d have mentioned something about their obvious and immediate success, wouldn’t you?

2010 and beyond..

Happy New Year!

The New Year has to be a time to think about life and a time to reflect. In these last few weeks I have  suddenly far more spare time than I am used to to reflect on everything: what we know have done well and what we should change for the better both at home and at work. I have also started knitting again as this is one occupation that can be done with a lower limb raised. The filing on my desk will have to wait a bit longer.

The last year has been so hectic for everyone in the household that we know it is time to try to change things. The daily workload has in all honesty become too much and I believe it has been good to step back [even on crutches] and actually acknowledge this.

Life events happen too and they can make one think even more and I belong to an online community called Purple Coo and this community has suffered a great sadness as one of the original members Woozle passed away peacefully in hospital yesterday evening after a major operation on 16th December.

I never met Woozle [although I read her posts including the last one she bravely wrote before she went to hospital] but many of the other members knew her in person and were very good friends. Woozle’s blog shines with her spirit and courage in the shadow of her illness scleroderma. She loved her husband, family, home and garden and despite her long illness was clearly a special person who enjoyed so much of her life, and she was very courageous.  Woozle particularly wrote about how working the soil in a garden connects us to the land, she was so right about that and farming is the same just on a much grander scale. We send our deepest sympathy to her husband, family and friends.

I too, am a daughter of the soil and Jethro is undoubtedly a son of the soil, this particular attribute runs in our blood and is deeply imbedded in our genes. This fact has not helped any of us get a balanced life as our work ethic and attention to detail has added to the current overload. The old adage for farming folk has always been ” Farm as if you will live forever, and live as if you will die tomorrow”. [Read it here]. There is some real common sense in this. Farms are very big and complicated businesses which depend on both the seasons and very long term planning while coping with all sorts of unknowns on a day to day basis [ such as weather and animal health]. Over the last five years my Jethro has become totally overloaded by his workload with hardly any time off and that has impacted on every generation of the family, and it cannot be good for his long term health.

The challenge of the new decade will be finding a better life/work balance for all of us, and we do not yet know how we will achieve this but the journey we will take will no doubt be interesting.

However, we will have to learn to walk normally again before we can all run into a new regime. The first steps for me will be abandoning the crutches and then the aircast boot and getting my normal life back because at the moment Jethro has to do many of my jobs [dogs, horse, chickens, and driving] as well as his own. Cooking is getting easier as I can weight bear for short distances, but as ever in a full household the dishwasher always seems to need emptying. Why is that?

Goodbye to 2009

Goodbye to 2009.

The last few days have been very busy and hard as life on crutches is very hampering, espeically on a farm in the winter. We are hoping 2010 will be much easier.

Since my accident 3 weeks ago we have had:

water through a bedroom ceiling from melting snow, leading to evacuation of  said room and entire contents of walk-in cupboard,

a car in the pond, while watching Cranford after some good whisky and it was nothing to do with us, except Jethro is the pond keeper so then the three fire engines, Police, ambulance, and several recovery vehicles  suddenly became a lot to do with us,

frozen and burst water pipes and troughs, leading to a full set of 9 new ballcocks and de-frosting of hands in between each trough,

a winter’s worth of snow for the second time this year leading to joyriders pulling sledges behind 4wd vehicles on private fields full of sheep, and the driver being certain it was ok for him to do this,

a lost [newly arrived, and not yet settled in] sheepdog on Chrismas Day after she touched her nose on the pig electric fencing, got a shock and unurprisingly ran off, to be thankfully retrieved 30 minutes later after she luckily had joined up with a local dog walker and his two dogs,

so it is no surpirise that we wonder what will be next?

That’s the thing about farming every day is different and there is always a lot to sort out… and having married a farmer, many years ago,  and as mother to another successful farmer it is no suprise to me to read that the most influential figure in farming over the last 75 years is none other than THE FARMER’S WIFE with 49% of the vote. Read here.

Happy New Year and all the best for the next decade and beyond.

beauty and the beast

This morning is bitterly cold and absolutely beautiful – the ultimate wintry scene and I hope someone will have time to take the camera out again to record it all later.

Unfortunately it remains an awful beast for those with farm animals and there seems to be no let up in this cold snap. No one has time to enjoy it. Contingency plans over the Christmas period now mean that all the staff will work some of every day as there is too much to do for one man. The normal plan at this time of year is that between Christmas Eve and the first Monday of the New Year only the essential jobs are done ie: the livestock and everyone takes turns on duty so everyone has time off. This year because of the weather conditions two men will work every morning and one working every afternoon.

The hens have stopped laying presumably in protest from the cold so we may have to run out to buy eggs. Or more likely do without as the roads in this locality are still too bad for a normal car and Jethro is much too busy to do any more of my tasks.

Swift is eating loads of hay and is warm in his gucci style rug. These rugs are very expensive but well worth it. I prefer to keep horses out in their natural environment and as it turned out it is just as well owing to my injury. The snow and the cold is much better for animals than relentless cold rain. Ruby has come inside and is in with the cows and young calves and more importantly in with the bull so we hope she will calve again next September.

We wish every one a safe and happy Christmas season, and wonder what this year’s unexpected challenge will be. Last year we had no electricity to work the water pump at the bore hole. Every year is different and this year will be no exception.

an interesting Christmas

The landscape may look like a Christmas card, but inside the house at Prosperous Farm, apart from having plenty of delicious food in store, it is nothing at all like Christmas.

A trip to the supermarket in Granpa’s old wheelchair last night saw the last of the seasonal provisions bought. It is a life lesson perhaps we should all take. The view from a wheelchair, as many people already know, is different, but it is something that should  be experienced at first hand to really understand. Free choice is not easily attained when one has to ask to be pushed up to every shelf, or to keep asking for this, that and the other to be fetched. As several members of the family rumbled round the packed supermarket in convoy with the shopping trolley we met up with several people we knew, all doing their last food shopping.  On leaving the shop we found we were in a very heavy snowstorm and today we have several more inches and a lot more ice.

There is no real tree this year, just a mini artificial one, and very few presents as shopping on crutches in heavy snow and ice is simply not going to happen. We will however still be able to concentrate on the food, with a few cheats such as ready-made cranberry sauce in mulled wine, and a few bought puddings, and of course the good company. We have home cured ham to cook tomorrow, home reared rib of beef to roast on Christmas Eve and no doubt a good turkey will arrive in due course for the big day. The breadcrumbs for the bread sauce are already in the freezer. Nature has buried the carefully grown veggies in snow and frozen ground, and some replacements were hastily bought from the supermarket,  however Jethro remains confident he can produce a swede and some sprouts for the big day.

We will be warm by the fire and together as a family, and be able to have lots of good things to eat. Thankfully we are not trying to cross the channel or are stuck far from home. Jethro will be very busy and we hope  for a thaw [but not too rapid a one, as that causes other problems] as the extra workload from all the livestock in this freezing and snowy weather grinds on. We even have made a contingency plan for other members of the family originally due to have Christmas elsewhere, if they can’t get to their planned destination on Thursday, we will have plenty of room and food.

Carols and the Christmas tradition will be courtesy of Kings College on Christmas Eve on the radio. We missed the village carol service on Sunday owing to the snow and ice and taking further unnecessary risks, and it is unlikely we will make it on the day itself  owing to the weather, workload and my plastered leg. In these winter conditions all the animals must be fed and watered daily.

Jethro said at breakfast that the meeting of world leaders in Copenhagen clearly achieved its aim as the weather has been dire and very cold ever since. Why has no-one else thought of this?

iced up once again

The joy of the young over waking to a covering of snow does not last long in livestock farming. The reality of keeping animals adequately fed and watered in difficult conditions sadly removes the initial glow of pleasure of a white landscape at an early age.

Already we are struggling to water all the livestock out doors and indoors as the pipes freeze and the water troughs ice up. Jethro takes the water bowser out with him to some of the animals twice a day but even the pipes on this ice up and have to be thawed. The cattle are better off  as in February this year we bought very large troughs which do not have to be filled daily as they have such a large capacity for water. Sheep actually drink less in these conditions as they eat some of the snow while grazing, it is the pigs who are always the thirstiest However they do not mind the cold and are happy living in their family groups sleeping and keeping warm in the straw filled arks. They lie in a heap together, often side by side, just like sausages in a pan.

The cold snap is early and combined with the dry summer and the fact that we have less grass than normal it is looking like it could be a long and tiring winter for both animals and men. You can imagine that we are all serious sceptics of global warming in this house.

An accident 2 weeks ago has put me on crutches so I am not able to help at all, and indeed all my jobs: Swift, the dogs and the chickens have been added to Jethro’s heavy workload. As the snow and ice reach right to the house I am banned from going outdoors in case of another fall.

Christmas will therefore be a rather funny affair too, a trip with a borrowed wheelchair to a local supermarket soon should see us get the last few things we need. I have not sent cards this year and luckily gave all the extended family home cured ham and bacon in October to freeze for the big day ahead. There will  have to be a lot of IOU’s written for the members of this household as I cannot get to a shop and the sudden snow and ice have made things far worse, in that respect. The day the accident happened I had planned to go shopping in the afternoon… instead I was in the hospital. The road is now only passable in the 4WD and apart from booking Jethro to take us food shopping, after a return trip to the hospital, there  is no spare time to take us to do anything else on account of the  conditions.  Annoyingly, I wont be able to drive for at least 6 weeks.

Still I can enjoy  a quieter life too. I will be making sausage rolls later, something I can do sitting down, even if someone else has to put the trays in and out of the oven. This afternoon I shall be in front of a snug fire with  my feet up watching Mamma Mia again, a present from last Christmas. And I get the chance to read books, lots of them, wicked! And when I have run out of good books there is some knitting started long ago to be finished, it was originally planned for a baby who is now 3, so if  I can actually finish it I will have something for the next baby in the family whenever that may be.

while shepherds watched…

Jethro has been sent this, ’tis surely the silly season!

While Shepherds Watched

While shepherds watched

Their flocks by night

All seated on the ground

The angel of the Lord came down

And glory shone around

The Union of Shepherd’s has complained that it breaches health and safety regulations to insist that shepherds watch their flocks without appropriate seating arrangements being provided, therefore  benches, stools and orthopaedic chairs are now available.

Shepherds have also requested that due to the inclement weather conditions at this time of year that they should watch their flocks via CCTV cameras from centrally heated shepherd observation huts.

Please note, the Angel of the Lord is reminded that before shining his/her glory all around she/he must ascertain that all shepherds have been issued with glasses capable of filtering out the harmful effects of UVA, UVB and Glory.

Happy Christmas

Happy Christmas to all. A little funny to help get through the darkest part of winter. ENJOY

Swift and the sheep

Swift has just done his first job on the farm. About ten days ago I rode out over two separate days for short rides and at a ridden walk quietly moved some sheep around the fields. He seemed to like this which I found encouraging.

Since then over the last week he has been spotted from the house playing games by moving the two sheep who share his grazing around by walking, and occasionally trotting  after them, making faces and generally calling the shots.

This week, I had to pick out a lamb to send tomorrow for an order for a restaurant for next week. As we still have no useful sheepdog I decided it was time to see if Swift and I could get quietly gather them to the gate to save time and effort.  We went through the three fields to the far end to collect any stragglers and found a ram, on his own. Luckily for me the ram was more scared of us and after turning once to look at me and stamping his foot he scarpered off to find his ladies. So we gathered up the little group of stragglers and set off across the next empty field.

Swift gave a little squeal and mini jump half way across this field and I carefully calmed him back down not wanting him to do a bronc act or anything remotely risky. He settled once more and we very gradually at a sedate walking pace pushed all the sheep to the gate and then I rang Jethro [ the wonders of mobiles] to say time for reinforcements please and the gate to be opened.

At just the wrong moment a power walker, talking loudly on a mobile phone, went past the gate scattering the sheep and making them run, completely in the wrong direction. By this point, in order to save the day and actually get the sheep in, I decided I would risk a trot so we set off in pursuit of the scrambling sheep. I was very aware that a canter would be better from a strategic point of view but I am not yet too sure of our brakes [with the Dually halter]  and I did not want to set off any sudden hi-jinks from Swift. Anyway at a steady trot we managed to get behind the sheep, turn them and bring them back to the gate.

Once on the road we had to trot down the lane to turn an escapee while avoiding the van that had also stopped. After this final dash I jumped off and led him from the ground to push the last few lambs in. Jethro was flapping his coat and everyone else was shouting and I felt that Swift had done really well and we needed to end on a good note.

We will see if he continues to play games with the sheep out in his field. He knows he can easily move the cow so we need to build his confidence with larger groups of cattle. He has got quite used to the cattle in the sheds, and even accepted the  calves who were weaned from their mothers only 48 hours ago and despite eating barley and silage are still mooing for their Mums.

a [very] funny film but beware the [very] bad language

We have just been sent this and feels it needs a much wider audience, however if you are sensitive to bad language, then please do not watch. Complaints will not be accepted, watching is your choice.

Will you ever look at a chicken in the same light again, and did you really know that wheat grows in the ground?

all change

Well, this week the first of the cattle came in for the winter, and the very last of the rams went out with the ewes but not before one of our best rams died suddenly as he waited in the shed.

As an older member of the team the anticipation must have been too much, or at least that is the reason we prefer most to believe. His place out with a particular batch of ewes was immediately taken by another home bred ram, and finally the rush of shepherding work at this time of the year is over and Jethro can settle back into a quieter routine.

Next to come in will be the calves, born this year. Those that were born in the spring and are old enough will be separated from their mothers and housed, the youngest calves will come in to another shed but their mothers will  come in too, and one of the bulls. The main herd of spring calving cows will remain outside on the drier chalk grassland.

Poor Ruby has slipped her calf, it was due to be born around the end of January, and was completely formed, a bull calf but without all his hair. The legs and the head were the same colour as Ruby, but the rest was still bald. It was a very sad sight when the vet pulled it out, and she was so very keen to mother this stillborn bundle of a calf.

It means no milking for us until she calves again, perhaps in the autumn next year. The vet says that around 1% of cattle sponatneously abort, there does not have to be a reason. I think in 5 years we have only had 3 slipped calves so we must be under the average but still it is hard particularly as Ruby is the family’s only cow whereas the rest belong to the farm business. It is not quite the same.  Unusually for farmers we do admit that Ruby is a pet, she leads from a headcollar and ties up and is so quiet even visiting children can milk her. I daresay when she is recovered and after she runs with the main herd and the bull for the winter she will take a bit of gentling again.

busy busy

What a day we’ve had – weighing lambs and pigs and selecting the best for boxes and a farmers market, vaccinating cattle with all manner of other visitors coming and going all day on farm business. No wonder we struggle so much with the shorter day length at this time of the year.

Last night haircuts were fitted in for the men after an early supper and our hairdresser’s life seems currently every bit as crazy as ours. Is it the planets or something else causing such chaos and too much work in all our lives?

Swift’s remaining three horseshoes were removed today too, just as well as it looked like whoever shod him before had tried to make his feet fit the shoes rather than the other way around. The trimmer was very patient as Swift is not yet very used to having this done. We got there in the end and although he sometimes puts his foot down sharpish a few times there was no malice in him whatsover. She will be back in three weeks time to properly trim his feet and we hope in a few months with regular trimming and work that his feet will harden and he will be able to remain ‘barefoot‘.

We also fitted in a sausage tasting this week to choose another variety to sell at our upcoming public events. Eight new  varieties of seasonings were made into patties and fried… remembering which is which on the plate as we taste them around the kitchen table is quite taxing and we all ended up with scribbled diagrams at the side to give us a clue. Everyone’s taste is so different but we eventually chose a new variety for lamb sausage and another new one for pork. We never have trouble selling bangers,  it may be a cliche but variety surely is the spice of life, or rather sausages. 

It is national sausage week this week but we were not able to have any events on to coincide. Perhaps next year we will make it fit with all the big promotions?