Welcome to our August newsletter 

(Sorry it's so late, I did write it weeks ago!)

Well, last month I talked about the hot dry weather and guess what, it’s still scorching! Now in mid August the temperatures have peaked again with quite a run of days over 30c. Much the same management is being deployed as before – plenty of shade, water, feed and extra checks for the cows, turkeys and sheep.  I was wondering how this current drought compared with 1976 so I consulted my weather guru – he informed me that 76 was preceded by 75 (funny that) which was dry in summer, autumn and winter so water reserves were well down already. This current drought was preceded by a dry late autumn and winter but reserves were in a good state prior to this. Between October ‘21 and July ‘22 we’ve only had 68% of the expected rainfall. We obviously use a lot more water as a nation than in 76, it’s worth remembering that 50% of water is used by households and we use 150L of it each per day – 30% of which is used to flush the loo! In parts of Africa people have to manage with 4L a day.

The cows

The cows have been grazing in Lydiard Park next to the barbeque area. This is the field where earlier in the year we made hay but left lots around the edge uncut because of the wild flowers. These long areas have been very useful now and kept the cows fed along with being topped up with the North Meadow hay so hopefully some of the seed will boost diversity in this field. I enjoy grazing this field as I often get to chat to people over the fence who are admiring the cattle. This has to be balanced with the need for evening checks to make sure there are no idiots bothering them and litter collecting. This time I also added signs onto the fence with a bit of info about the cows which I’d been wanting to do for a long time but never managed it.

A bit of building work with Dad and Uncle Richard !

We’ve taken the opportunity of our brook being very low to continue the bridge repair which has been a long running project that we started last year. The bridge is on the exit route from the pop-up shop and used during the week by our tenant business. Over the years the front of the central pier of the bridge had begun to break up so we had to partially dismantle the bridge to re build. This is made tricky by the fact that the 2 spans either side of the pillar are constructed out of huge flag stones 6’ x 4’ weighing perhaps as much as a tonne. Lowering them back onto the repaired pillar has now been done so we now just have to lay the concrete roadway over the top.

Swallow update

7 first brood nests successfully fledged and 7 pairs of these have tried for a second brood although one nest is in a different place so I’m not sure if it’s the same pair.

Of those 7 second broods 1 was predated by Magpies, 2 succumbed to the heat, 3 have fledged and one’s still to leave the nest. The yard is now alive with Swallows especially in the mornings. In the heat many have been roosting up over our farm office, when disturbed they stream out of the opening giving the appearance of fruit bats emerging from a cave in the tropics.

Other birds of note - Redstarts passing through on the 3rd August, several Kingfisher sightings and a Linnet which I don’t see many of, especially in the summer. I also had a stunning view of a Hobby making multiple swoops at the Swallows in the yard.

This month off the farm

Lindsay and I made a flying visit to a beautiful farm in a very secluded part of the Cotswolds. The Handy’s farm at Shipton and for some time have been growing sainfoin which used to be commonly grown across the free draining land of the Cotswolds. It’s a deep rooting plant so can survive drought, a legume so produces its own nitrogen in the way clovers do and it is high in protein and very palatable so stock love it. Also, it flowers over a long period and is irresistible to insects! Unsurprisingly many consider it a wonder crop. I presume it fell out of favour when the Cotswolds became mainly arable and the sainfoin hay wasn’t needed for the many sheep that would have eaten it through the winter.

Nowadays sainfoin is mainly used as part of the herbal ley mixes which are becoming ever more popular with farmers who want drought resilience and to cut nitrogen use. The Handy’s grow their sainfoin for seed to supply Cotswold Seeds and then cut it and bale it as haylage. Because the plant is a perennial rather than an annual this harvesting can go on for many years without the need for soil damaging cultivation.

Some believe that the development of perennial grain producing plants like sainfoin will be vital for the survival of the planet as our complete dependence on annual crops like wheat, barley, rice and soya is seen as unsustainable by an increasing amount of people – but I better leave that for another issue or the editor will be running out of space for the crossword!

Anyway, we bought a couple of sainfoin bales to use as a trial to feed our sheep before lambing, it should give them the protein boost needed and allow us to keep reducing less sustainable cereal based bagged feed which we currently use.

The sainfoin fields we saw were not only packed with blooms but also completely surrounded by not one but two wild flower margins, it was spectacular.  

Turkey update

We’ve also been working hard preparing the next shed area for the turkeys to move into. The turkeys will have 25% more indoor space this year because although they spend all day outside, I’m anticipating avian influenza being an issue again this autumn, so a larger indoor area will be much better for them if they have to be housed. Dad is busy building me an extra pop hole for them in the new shed space so they have plenty of room to walk in and out. This is important as at dusk if they have insufficient room to walk in, they will roost outside – and we don’t want too many doing that! 

Pop-up farm shop - Saturday 1st October 10am - noon

Our next pop-up shop is on the 1st October, no shop in September due to a much needed holiday.

Thank you to everyone who came to our August one, it was our busiest one ever.

The last lamb and mutton boxes will be available to order on our website from mid September for collection at this shop and then we swap to full on Christmas turkey ordering from 1st October!

Lindsay's Shepherd update

Tupping time is just 2 weeks away. This is a time when I have to select the right ram to go with the right ewe to produce next years crop of lambs.

My sheep are pedigree so making this decision is very important as we obviously don't want any inbreeding within the flock.

In preparation for tupping, 2 weeks before, I put Graham my teaser ram in with all the ewes, he is a vasectomised ram so still behaves and smells like a ram but has all the fun and no responsibility! His presence in the flock gets the ewes cycling (in season) ready for when the actual rams get put in. This means I should have a shorter lambing period so shouldn't need to spend too many weeks sleeping in the campervan in the lambing shed come February.