Friday 19 May 2017

Spring 2017






Spring 2017 we think might go down as one of our best lambing seasons.  The weather has been on our side and we are so thankful.  We had our first set of twins on the 24th March and our two lovely vet students, Molly and Emma arrived that day.  A steady start but it wasn't long until we were in full flow and the routine checks and systems were in place.

We had lots of lovely people come and join us to be shepherds for the day and a very special piece of farm machinery was brought out of retirement to help take our guests around the fields to check the ewes.  My fathers old Dexta.  Very nostalgic as we used to use her for bringing ewes and lambs in from the fields when I was young.

Our lambing open days were busy with lots of visitors and plenty of lambs being born for everyone to enjoy.  George who drove our tractor didn't stop doing trailer rides and explaining to everyone how we are farming this small part of the South Downs.  Thank you to everyone who came and to all our amazing helpers, we are so grateful.

We also hosted some of the chefs we supply in Brighton and locally to us.  Michael and Sam from 64degrees, Mark from the Ginger Fox and Charlie from the Chimney House.  We had a great day and hope we can make it an annual event.

Lambing has officially finished but calving hasn't!  We still have one first time mum in the barn who shows no sign yet that she is ready to calve.  All her friends and the General are outside enjoying the spring grass, especially after the much needed rain we have just had.  The General is a happy man being back with his wives and this years calves are growing well.

Our neighbour Pat has drilled our wildbird seed mix for this year plus our spring barley undersown with grass.  We are so grateful for the rain!  It has been so dry we were worried about planting it.  We can already see some germinating seedlings.

Busy getting ready for Open Farm Sunday, 11th June, come and join us!  

More soon

Camilla, Roly, Molly, Freddie, Finch, Fly and Belle