Archived News

27th June 2013

Another exciting day on the farm; finally Yvette has calved, having looked fit to pop for at least a fortnight, whereas Snowflake barely looked pregnant and she calved last Friday!

Yvette had a big, strong bull calf with something on his back I can only compare at the moment to a human ‘skin tag’, because I have not seen it before (such as we humans might have as we get older).  It’s covered in hair and may not have been noticed immediately had it not been for the tip of the hair being white, similar to a birth mark!   It’s not hurting the calf but the vet will take a look and may have some explanation.

The five calves born at Raikes in April have moved with their dams to some lush new grass at Friday Street, whilst calving at Churchfield is going well; with four heifer calves and three bulls so far and one more due but not showing any signs yet.

'Ed' born 24th June 2013

Our Belties are renowned for hiding their calves in nettles and long grass in-between feeds; this keeps the calf safe when the mother is grazing, but in the past when cows have calved in either a string of large fields such as West Lawn or the fields at Abinger Hall with varied terrain and habitat, we have spent hours searching for hidden calves!

So with the third group of cows due to calve in July, we walked them yesterday from West Lawn to Hackhurst, where we can keep a closer eye on them during calving and have access to the adjacent barn if any of the cows need veterinary help.

The younger Belted Galloways had their initial BVD vaccines three weeks ago and the second dose this week.  As it takes some time to round up the cattle and run them through the crush we take the opportunity to undertake any tasks such as treating for flies at this time of year or moving the cattle.  In the last couple of days we have moved two more groups of Belties onto the North Downs for summer grazing; they are now on Hackhurst Down, Blatchford Down and the Ranges.

Eighteen months ago in freezing weather, six of the grain store bins were converted to enable them to be emptied more efficiently.  Previously the grain bins had flat floors which meant that every time a grain bin was emptied, the final quantity of grain had to be shovelled out by hand and this took two men, two hours per bin.

Ed makes metal supports for the funnel shaped floors

The final six bins are now being converted and the pressure is on to be ready for harvest.

The sheep were sheared this evening and they look very strange without their teddy-bear appearance. 

Nathen made handling the sheep look very easy, which it definitely is not!

Edward helped with the sheep handling and even had a go at shearing.