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February-09-07 - February 2007

Last week we picked up a load of wood-chip from Caernarfon to go into our cattle handling pens. This is becoming an increasingly common practice, (as well as for bedding cattle) as the price of straw increases. The price of straw could further increase in the future if more land is used up for producing bio-fuels, and straw used in straw burning power stations. It is also a good way of recycling old timber such as shredded pallets which avoids the need to put them into increasingly expensive landfill sites. The one disadvantage of using wood-chip for bedding is that the resultant manure needs to be composted for longer before spreading on the land in order for the pieces of wood to break down before application.

The land we have taken over at Caernarfon is progressing well and we recently had our initial Soil Association inspection as well as the Farm Assurance inspection. Our organic conversion officially started on the first of December 2006, which means that the farm will be organic on the first of December 2008. This seems such along way ahead now, but speaking from experience, it will soon be with us. Last week all of our Aberdeen Angus cows were freeze branded with their unique number so that they will be easier to identify out in the fields, especially when they calve. They are also less likely to lose a brand than a plastic tag! By the time this is printed, hopefully, most of the cows will have been transported to their new home at Ty Mawr in preparation for calving from the middle of March onwards.

It was disappointing and upsetting to hear recently of the outbreak of Avian ‘Flu on a turkey farm in Suffolk. We will all hope that the contingency plans put in place by the DEFRA vets and officials will have been sufficient to control the outbreak and prevent it from spreading further. We, as poultry producers, need to be vigilant and tighten up on bio-security to protect our birds as much as possible.

On a brighter note, the lambing season has started with us at Rhug, just in time to coincide with the first real snow of winter! We will be lambing around 185 ewes now, with the majority lambing from the third week of March onwards. We will also have some ewes lambing into May. The spread of dates is necessary to try and even out the supply of finished lambs into our shop throughout the year.

The recent frosty weather has enabled us to spread the majority of our Compost onto the land in preparation for ploughing and sowing this year’s spring crops. The compost will be ploughed in from the beginning of March onwards closely followed by the sowing of crops such as Oats, Triticale, Beans and grass, which will be used for feeding our livestock during next winter.

Written By: Gareth Jones

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