Farmer's Blog

Both Llanrwst and Eglwysbach shows have been and gone (and the sheep have had their opportunity for this year to strut their stuff!). Although both shows are similar in size and attendance, Eglwysbach had the most competitors with 10 breeders showing and the largest class having 14 entries. I was more than happy going home with a 2nd and a couple of fourth prizes in what were an excellent show of animals. Llanrwst show followed, and seemed cursed from the start due to the continuous rain we had on the Friday which meant the sheep were soaking wet coming in to be prepared!

However, after being towel dried, and blessed with sunshine on Saturday morning, they’d dried off by the time they were to compete. Llanrwst had 6 breeders competing, and a different judge to the previous week’s show. He must have liked my sheep as I had two firsts, two seconds, a third and a fourth prize in what was again an excellent show of sheep - my Senior ram then went on to be crowned reserve breed champion! As I’m only competing in two local shows and it was nice to go out and retire on a high……. Time will now tell if marketing stock at local shows will result in better prices for breeding rams which are due to be sold in 3 weeks.

Back on the farm, the weather has been somewhat unsettled; we’ve harvested some grass as big bale silage and will hopefully be able to get the oat/ peas crop as well as some more grass into the silage clamp this weekend. The recent news of a ban on wheat export from Russia has already resulted in a hike in UK wheat prices which in turn will directly affect the price of supplementary feed for the ewes pre & post lambing.
It’s also going to be an exiting time for me over the next couple of weeks as I’m moving out to live with my girlfriend! Apart from University, this is the first time I’ve lived away from ‘home’, I only hope that Elliw will be able to put up with me!

August is a month which sees most agricultural shows being staged; and over the next consecutive Saturday’s we have Eglwysbach and Llanrwst. Both are local shows for me, and the only two that I tend to show my stock at, although I’d like to attend more (as its effectively a shop window for when I sell breeding stock to other farmers); but working off farm, time is limited.
The breed of sheep that I keep is the Charollais, this is a typical meat breed, which we cross with a maternal breed (Lleyn) to produce prime Welsh Lamb. Eglwysbach, although a small country village, has quite a spectacular show and is able to attract competitors, visitors and judges from far and wide. The judge for the Charollais this year is from North Scotland, and will therefore have travelled a fair distance to attend, but from what I’ve heard he will have large classes to cast his eye over as well.

Preparation for shows is quite an art, the animals need to be in the right condition (not to lean or over fat), they need to be correct in terms of breed characteristics (for example muscle depth) and if they are to catch the eye of the judge, they will need to stand out. Showing takes months of preparation to ensure the animals look at their best. All breeders will have subtle differences in how they prepare their animals which is down to stockmanship.

I have entered 6 animals in total, an older ram and ewe, yearling ram (a ram that is one year old) and ewe and a ram and ewe lambs (born this year). Preparation involves a sheep style haircut and fake tan, the aim being for the bums to look bigger and for them to stand out a bit more to catch the eye of the judge. Time will tell on Saturday if it will have worked; regardless it will be a good opportunity to see where my stock sits in the rankings with fellow breeders.

Some of you may have found the eatwelshlamb.co.uk website has undergone something of a revamp in recent weeks, and now I’ve got a page dedicated to myself! Over the coming weeks and months, this page will feature current blog postings as well as recipes, and quite frankly all things lamb!
Talking of lamb, I haven’t been home much over the last week or so due to my annual trip/ holiday to the Royal Welsh show in Builth Wells. Whenever I go away (even for a day) there are always things that need to be done before I go, so before the Royal Welsh it was a case of weaning the earlier group of lambs born, and moving to a better aftermath pasture. I travelled down to the show on the Sunday and duly pitched the tent before heading out to meet friends old and new- many whom I wouldn’t come across if it wasn’t for the show.
HCC’s corporate stand was as busy as ever, with a visit from officials linked with the Chinese ambassador creating plenty of interest; I’m not sure what the translation of lamb is in Chinese, but this ambassador certainly seemed to enjoy the lamb tastings on offer and will hopefully help in generating more demand for Welsh Lamb in Chinese markets. The show, largely dominated by farmers and countryside dwellers is a good opportunity to show what marketing activity is being undertaken on behalf of Welsh Lamb, Welsh Beef & pork producers; so on Monday afternoon I had to get apron on and assist Elwen (HCC’S Consumer Executive) in cooking demonstrations!

I think it went well, but for the rest of the week Elwen got better qualified celebrities including Julian Lewis Jones to cook alongside her!
The show is always a hive of activity, and this year had the World Shearing championships being held there- a truly memorable and exiting final won by the New Zealand team. A new experience for me this year was being a pundit for TV coverage of the sheep section, I hope that I did a good job! I returned from the show late Wednesday evening, despite the show itself not finishing until Thursday.
Since, its been a happy occasion for our family as well, my nephew- Ifan was born early on Friday morning and my cousin got married on Saturday. Pob lwc Angharad a Damian

These last couple of weeks have been busy to say the least, largely dominated by sheep work. Shearing is now completed, and I’m sure the ewes appreciated getting rid of their winter plumage in favour of their cooler summer outfit! A friend of mine who is a contract shearer did the job with assistance from two other local young farmers. Between them, they’d shorn 600 in a day. It also looks like wool is becoming fashionable again with the price forecast to align with the cost of shearing- something that has not happened in recent years.

The warm weather also bring challenges in terms of flies irritating the sheep, especially growing lambs. To alleviate this we therefore apply a repellent that is active for about 12 weeks and covers the risk season. The withdrawal period for slaughter is short for the brand we use which allows us to continue marketing our lambs throughout the summer. The latest batch, sold to a local butcher gave me the opportunity to see the carcass, and it was pleasing to have a comment of the lambs having larger than average chops. One of the things were doing with our pedigree flock (for producing rams) is monitoring their growth, muscularity and fat cover to breed growthy, meatier animals without excess fat.

Having not had, until this week, any rain for a while, a number of our fields are seriously dry, and grass growth is suffering as a result. In order to get more land freed up for the sheep, and to take advantage of the weather, we cut a couple of fields for hay making. This involves mechanically turning the grass for 3 – 4 days to dry (similar to producing sun dried tomatoes) and then baling into small bales. Historically this was the main method of conserving winter forage on many farms, but due to it reliance on the weather and labour involved its not as common practice. We had 218 bales, which will be handy for putting in racks when the ewes are in their individual pens after lambing, or as supplementary feed if we get a snow covering like this year.

With a break in the dry spell earlier this week, and some welcome rain, hopefully our swede seedlings will emerge to guarantee a crop for autumn/ winter grazing.

I’m back home safe and sound! 5 nights in Portugal certainly recharged the batteries, and the sunshine ensured good spirits. A break away from the farm and the sheep, but not from the marketing of Welsh lamb- it doesn’t matter where one goes, Wales will always have a connection with Welsh lamb! Even in Taffy’s bar at Praia da Rocha, stickers promoting Welsh lamb were evident on the walls!
I had a day at home that was spent shearing a small batch of our pedigree ewes, and then travelled to the Urdd Eisteddfod in mid Wales, competing with Aelwyd Bro Cernyw, we got to the stage with the 15 minute of entertainment competition, but did not make it with the choirs; despite this, a good day was had. Congratulations also to all who competed- the standard really does put our TV talent shows to shame at times.
Back on the farm we’ve marketed our first lambs of the season; born in the last week of February, these had been out on grass since a few days old and were 37.5kg liveweight. As farmers this week, for the past 3 years, has been crucial in terms of price as supply and demand tend to plateau, affecting the price. More lambs will be marketed over the next 4 months or so and we’ll be watching the price carefully to determine what time and weight to sell our lambs at.

The recent dry weather has burnt off some areas where the rock is close to the surface, but rain in the last few days has refreshed pastures and encouraged grass growth.
We’ve also got additions to the family- our Jack Russell/ rat catcher bitch has given birth to 7 sheepdog pups…… A neighbour’s kelpie dog had visited us on a few occasions, and despite keeping our bitch in the kennel when he did his rounds, it seems that both have caught us out. It seems that dogs to, need love!!

This is quite a quick and bleary eyed blog posting! Were waiting to check in at Liverpool airport and board a flight to Portugal for a few nights break and had a bit of time to spare!
My father has been left in charge of the sheep at home for the next week whilst I’ll be relaxing in the Algarve. So long as the volcano in Iceland behaves for the next couple of hours, we’ll be on our way!
Due to return home on Thursday evening and Friday will be spent checking and doing work on the farm ahead of the National Urdd Eisteddfod in Aberaeron over the weekend when the local ‘Aelwyd’ (club) that I’m a member of will be competing in the choir and 15 minutes of entertainment competitions.
Pob lwc/ Good luck Aelwyd Bro Cernyw

Lambing has finally finished! The last ewe lamb gave birth on 4th May, and are out in the field with the rest of the sheep. On reflection, this year’s lambing season started well, the wintry weather at the end of March caused some difficulty, but overall I think it went well. We’re lambing inside, single bearing ewes in one shed, and multiples in a second one built around 5 years ago, and although it involves more labour than outside lambing, the reassurance that losses can be minimised in bad weather and ability to rest the fields for a couple of months outweighs the costs.

Grass is still slow to grow, but what is growing is of high quality and nutritional and most of the lambs have now been drenched and marked with our branding (a black ‘N’ on the middle of back on the left hand side). All the rams have also been shorn- this is done by myself as its done about a month before the main flock when contractors are drafted in. I’ve high regard for ‘professional’ shearers who can peel the wool off a sheep in less than a minute. Contending with 28 strong, determined, and uneasy rams took a while to get the job done, the length of time I’m too embarrassed to disclose! Anyway, at least now, with the weather improving it will be better for them in their summer gear as apposed to warm woolly coats!

Much of the work on the farm at this time of year is field work. Fields need to be shut off for conserving the grass as silage, any areas poached (fileds where the grass has been trampled by the animals)  have been re seeded, and we need to control weeds. Our oats and pea seedlings are just starting to emerge, and we’ll shortly be preparing the field for this year’s planned crop of swedes.

With lambing mearly over, it seems somewhat strange the first show of the season is taking place over the weekend at Nefyn on the Lleyn Peninsula. This is a show that I haven’t attended in the past, but this year I have been asked to be a judge, and to be honest am nervously looking forward to it!

I’ve 4 classes to judge in total- an ewe with her own lamb, pair of butchers (finished) lambs, pet lamb where I will be judging on the sheep’s merit, and the young handler competition which, as the name suggests will be judged on the individual’s ability to handle and display the sheep accordingly. This will be a totally new experience for me, but I’m hoping that advice received from experienced judges, previously competing with my own sheep, and partaking in Young Farmer competitions will put me in good stead to award the right placings to each competitor!

Not sure what the weather forecast is for Monday, but some dry weather wouldn’t go a miss. I’m also hoping that it will stay dry until the weekend for us to finish ploughing and seeding our peas/ oats and grass crop for this year. The field, which is heavy clay had become quite compacted and therefore we’ve used a mechanical underground spike or ‘pan buster’ to loosen the soil structure which should enable the crop roots to go deeper and aid the crop in better establishment. Time will tell if it has been a success.

With regards to lambing, we have 5 ewe lambs left, I’m hoping to get a photo of our last lamb (once its born!) onto the blog to offically mark the end of 2010 lambing! However, on Monday I expect the lambs will be a little bit older and will have been born a few months.

Pob lwc i bawb fydd yn cystadlu!

Good luck to all those competing!

Since my last blog, the latest count left to lamb is 19, made up of 5 ewes and 14 ewe lambs, we’re down to a single lamb being born a day in this last week (2 if were lucky), but they must give birth by the end of this month as they were separated from the rams at the beginning of December. So, unless something has jumped a fence, we should be averaging 2 births between now and the end of the month!
Despite the fantastic weather in the last week, we’ve decided to keep the ewes in as we’re still having frost on some evenings, and the lambs tend to be bigger, which means we are assisting more births than normal.
This warm weather has definitely made a difference, the grass looks lush and the sheep are looking better by the day, daffodils are in full bloom, and the hedges we planted over winter are flourishing. Weeds are also becoming apparent! Longer days are also useful, as we must take advantage of this weather to undertake fieldworks.
With this warm weather, there is also an increased risk of nemotidirus (a worm in the pasture) which affects lamb growth, we’ve therefore drenched (dosed) our February born lambs, and will be doing the rest over the next few weeks. One problem we’ve encountered this year is that a preventative measure to reduce the risk of ‘orf’ (blisters on lambs lips) has not worked as effectively as previous years; and seems to have affected the growth rate of some lambs which goes against the saying that prevention is better than cure as we’re having to do both.
Our cattle will still be housed for another week or so, as we must prioritise what grass we have for the sheep, and ensure there is sufficient growth before they’re turned out onto the fields. They’re currently finishing off our silage clamp and the left over fodder beet we’d bought for the ewes which they can’t get enough of.
So, hopefully by my next blog, our cattle will be outside for the summer and we should be finished lambing for another year.

First and foremost- apologies for not having posted a blog for a while, it’s been busy couple of weeks. As mentioned in previous blogs, our flock is split in terms of lambing, with the older ewes lambing at the end of February and younger and ewes that are breeding flock replacements lambing at the end of March. As I’m writing this blog, we have 47 left to lamb, and for some reason, the majority of those are scanned as carrying singles- the only explanation I can think of for this is that the nutritional value of grass had deteriorated by early November (when the ewes conceived) and they were not on the same rising plane of nutrition as when the rams went in a couple of weeks earlier.
Generally, lambing has gone ok, the weather causing some difficulties for turning young lambs outside, a 3 inch covering of snow last week was unexpected and caught us out- but it could have been much worse had we been lambing outside. Due to limited space inside, we had to turn some out whilst there was snow on the ground, but we did armor them with polythene over coats to help them keep warm- the only problem being that by the following morning the wind had blown most of them off! Not to worry though, as all that did go out to the snow survived, and as there was no grass for the ewes they seemed to couple with their lambs much better.
One investment that we’ve done this year is to install a CCTV camera in the lambing shed, it’s a relatively cheap version which works on wireless frequency, but has definitely proved its worth especially during the night where one can see and hear what’s happening from the comfort of the house. It’s also been quite interesting to look at how some sheep behave when left to their own devices, and obviously to identify those that are to lamb imminently.
Despite the arrival of so many lambs, spring is still slow to emerge, our daffodils are yet to open despite coastal areas having been in full bloom since about 3 weeks ago, and this spell of cold and wet weather is not encouraging grass growth, with the sheep still reliant on fodder beet for the main source of energy. I’m told that the 13th of this month will be a turning point!
Just looking at the CCTV, and an ewe has just lambed, so I’d better go and put them in the small pen…….