Wiltshire Village Meats Farm Diary - August 2007 - harvest at last

	Wiltshire Village Meats Welfare - - Quality				In association with Walter Rose and son Family Butchers
AUG 2008 JUL 2008 JUN 2008 MAY 2008 APR 2008 MAR 2008 FEB 2008 JAN 2008 DEC 2007 NOV 2007 OCT 2007 SEP 2007 AUG 2007	FARM DIARY THE EVERYDAY STORY OF LIFE ON A WILTSHIRE FARM
	Links to other pages HOME FARM SHOP CARDS WALTER ROSE ABOUT OUR FARMING FARM DIARY RECIPES QUESTIONS CONTACT US		August 2007 Harvest weather at last Between the rain storms we managed to finish harvesting all the oilseed rape - now the wheat is ready to be started. At last the weather seems to have taken a turn for the better and the fields don't look quite so sodden and brown. It will be difficult harvesting the flattened crops - they will be left a bit longer to give them a chance to dry more. So far the harvest has had it's usual numbers of breakdowns and blockages which take hours to sort out. As well as dealing with drying and cleaning the grain there is the straw to be baled and picked up. Lorries to be loaded with the grain for sale and seed to be bought for the nextyears crops. It is a very difficult and stressful time. With the wet weather we have used more straw than usual- we have a weeks worth of straw left so we will need to get some wheat cut and the straw baled as soon as possible. It is a bit too close for comfort. 1st August 2007 Slow worm Yesturday we came across a slow-worm in a field over near Westbury, Wilts. These are actually legless lizards rather than snakes and are uncommon. This poor creature had shed its tail and was feigning dead while the detached tail thrashed around. This is a behaviour that tends to lead the predator to attack the discarded tail and leave the slow-worm alone so we assume something had attacked or frightened it. 3rd August 2007 Foot and Mouth Disease The news tonight that Foot and Mouth disease has been confirmed in England sends a chill down the spine. Fortunately the Government appears to be reacting swiftly and control measures are in place while they trace the source and extent of the outbreak. Memories of the 2001 outbreak are vivid. Our farm was closed for 10 weeks as there was an outbreak within 4 miles. With movement restrictions in place we cannot sell any pigs (we sell pigs every week). Obviously we will still have pigs being born which we can no longer move from Soley to West End so we will rapidly run out of accomodation. Plus the feed costs of feeding extra pigs will be astronomical with no income from pig sales to pay for it! It is not a happy prospect and one we hope will not be long lived. We hope and pray the movement restrictions will be only be necessary for a week or two in which case the implications will be manageable. Please, please buy British meat to support farmers - don't let supermarkets use this as an opportunity to buy in more imports and push the price down for UK farmers. 17th August 2007 Foot and Mouth Disease update From today we can move store pigs from our breeding unit to our barns at Bishops Cannings. We can only do this as the two units are within 50km of each other and in the same ownership. The pigs have to be inspected by a vet first (at our expense of course) and only on the basis of a welfare need. As we have piglets being born all the time had we not been able to move the pigs we would have had to overcrowd them and make temporary pens. A serious welfare issue would have arisen very quickly. We are very relieved that some movements are now allowed. We have also been able to sell pigs but unfortunately there is a huge backlog so we haven't sold as many as we need to. This means the pigs we are selling are overweight and fatter than the supermarkets like so we will get a financial penalty. This all causes financial headaches exacerbated by the horrendous price of feed caused by the high cereal prices. As the supermarkets won't pay any more for the meat pig keeping is currently an exercise in losing money! Harvest update All is not doom and gloom - at least the sun has shone occasionally and the harvest is well underway. With periods of heavy rain in between the sun it is a race against the clock. Our staff have to do all their usual pig work and then do many hours overtime until late at night clearing the fields of straw bales and drying the grain. It is an intense time and very tiring and we really appreciate their hard work. 28th August 2007 Harvest update We finished combining on Saturday 25th which is a great relief. We still have a lot of straw to be baled and picked up. Every evening when the normal pig work is done we have a 'straw-gang' of permanent and casual staff who carry on loading straw at least until its dark and frequently later. We always seem to acquire a diverse group of people to help - this year we have an Oxbridge student, a police inspector, a retired builder and a water engineer. I think part of it is the love of driving tractors - they can correct me if I'm wrong if they read this! Ploughing the fields for the next crops happens immediately so that is the next preoccupation. Seed and fertiliser have to be ordered. In recent years we have saved some of our own seed, samples of this have to be sent off for germination testing. The other great preoccupation is field moving the breeding pigs at Soley. Every two years we have to move everything onto fresh ground to give the land a break and to prevent disease build-up. This is a huge exercise and has to be completed by the end of September - I'll keep you updated in September.
	For further information on anything on this site please contact Muriel Naughton Email: Naughton@Farming.co.uk