Farm Update - May 2022

Wow, what a month! It's been all go for us this past few weeks and we are ready to crash! Calving, lambing, drilling, rolling, fertiliser spreading, school visits and so much more … but it's no rest for the wicked as we head in to silage season and cattle turn out. It's a good job we love what we do! 

Lambing 

Lambing is all done for 2022 here with us in Northmoor. 100 ewes and circa 200 lambs are now happily grazing in the fields. It was our second year of lambing, having never done it before either on our own farm or with anyone else. To say we have learnt on the job is an understatement! But this year felt entirely different to last - we were so much more confident in trusting our instincts, in nursing the poorly ones, and in knowing when to intervene. Having said that we still have so much to learn and are so grateful to our farming neighbours for sharing their knowledge and expertise with us.

It seems our sheep are super fertile, and not only did they scan really high, but we also had some surprise mega multiples … 3 sets of quads, and one set of QUINS! This is really rare and the ewe even managed to lamb them independently. Quite amazing. Five is a few too many for the ewe to raise independently so 2 of them were taken away from the Mum and are living their best life with the bottle fed crew, receiving plenty of cuddles and lots of love from our girls and all our farm visitors. 

Cattle 

Calving is also over for us until the Autumn, and we have welcomed some cracking calves to the farm this Spring. The sun is shining and the first lot of cattle are now grazing the meadows, it's always so nice to see them down by the river with the sun on their backs!  We're busy checking and repairing fences so we can let out the rest. Now we are TB free and movement restrictions have been lifted, we are looking to sell one of our current bulls and buy in a new one. This is so we can keep the gene pool fresh and prevent in-breeding in the herd. 

Arable Crops 

Obviously everything comes at once, and right in the middle of lambing we have also been trying to get crops in the ground… drilling, rolling and fertiliser spreading. You might remember that a month or so ago we were desperately waiting for the ground to dry up so we could go drilling. Well that happened, we have planted the crops, and have subsequently had one of the driest Aprils on record. We could really do with some rain now (stereotypical farmer weather chat … no the weather really is never quite right!). Currently some of the seeds are sat in the ground in what can only be described as a dust bowl with no signs of germination. We have had a couple of sprinklings of rain over the last couple of days so we are preying this is enough to get them growing, and that more rain will follow to allow them to establish well. 

School Visits

For anyone who follows us on social media you will have seen that we have welcomed approximately 85 school children to the farm this month. We started with a small group of Academic Scholars from Cheltenham College - their visit consisted of a farm walk learning all about regenerative agriculture and conservation in farming. They kept us on our toes with plenty of insightful and thoughtful questions, and whilst picnicking by the river we enjoyed listening to them debate 3 topical rural issues. Once the debating was over we headed back to the farm just in time for them to cuddle and feed the lambs (you're never too old hey!).

This week we've gone back to having little ones on the farm with 70 reception and year 1 children visiting us from an Oxford school. For some of them this was their first experience of visiting a farm and seeing real life farm animals. They enjoyed a farm tour, tractor and trailer ride, nature crafts, lamb feeding and cuddles, plenty of running around, and endless games of stuck in the mud (we didn't need to go to the gym after this visit!). To see their confidence and enthusiasm grow as the day went on was magical … some of them didn't want to go home! Over the coming weeks the farm visits continue, and we are welcoming a group of home educated children to the farm, followed by some year 6 pupils from another Oxford school … we can't wait!