A Busy Start to the Season
I know, I know, I haven’t posted in a while. But I’ve been busy running a farm, alright!
I say running a farm rather than a business because, especially at the moment, life is about growing produce and looking after the livestock to sell later in the season.
So where am I at?
One of my ewe lambs
Lambing is complete. We rounded it off with 9 lovely lambs; a Norfolk Horn tup, a NH meat lamb, 6 ewe lambs (4 Jacobs and 2 crosses) and MacDuff - the rejected Jacob wether that’s wormed his way into both Saad and my hearts. The six ewe lambs will all be for sale once they’re fully vaccinated in about six weeks. I’m pretty excited to have my own tup too; though lambs can change significantly as they grow so it remains to be seen whether he’ll be decent enough to breed from. The longterm goal is to breed two lines of Brimwood Norfolk Horns that I can then breed them, resulting in sheep that both have Brimwood Farm parents. Meanwhile, the NH meat lamb is also a good outcome; we will finally be able to have home-reared, high welfare meat from our own farm. That is such an achievement. I’ve never wanted to become a conveyor belt of meat so the fact that just one of this year’s lambs is destined for the freezer is actually a really good result; good, local food but not mass market farming.
The status of the goats is not quite as celebratory. In fact, of the four pedigree Anglo Nubian nannies I had, only one remains. I lost Pye and Pixie to listeriosis; HUGE learning curve. I had been feeding them haylage thinking that I was actually providing them with a beneficial diet. However, it seems that haylage - and now I’ve done research on this it seems obvious - carries more of a risk of listeriosis. This bacteria thrives in warm, moist environments - and what is haylage? Exactly that! Then my lovely Peaches ended up being pregnant with triplets. She lost them all a month early and then went downhill and I had to have her PTS. So, Eve remains.
JJ reaches for crab apple leaves despite the rain
JJ returned to the farm in January (and his prodigy have just been born - five lovely kids) and I’m assuming Eve is pregnant and will give birth towards the end of June or early July. I’ve learned another HUGE lesson from keeping my nannies with the wethers … i.e. it’s a no, no. The wethers were too rough and it resulted in two lots of stillbirths. So Eve and JJ live separately now and seem much happier.
Meanwhile, the incubator is whirring away with chick, pheasant and duck eggs. I’ve got two ducks on nests and a goose on 7 eggs. If you’re thinking of hatching yourself, check out my recommended gear. I’m also thrilled to be selling hatching eggs, especially from the rare breed Silver Appleyard ducks and Ixworth chickens.
A khaki campbell hatches
The Market Garden and Flower Farm
As for the growing side of things, this year has been interesting weather-wise; i.e a total drought! This is really difficult when I have no mains water on site. At the moment, I use pumps to move water across from a natural pond to irrigate the farm, but I desperately need rain to re-fill that pond!
However, stuff IS growing. Ranunculus, anemones and hesperis are currently thriving and May’s markets are all about these bouquets. I’m continuing to have theft issues on the farm gate, so I’m only filling the stand with flowers at the weekend. The weather also affects this; the stand is quite exposed to the sun and wind - that is NOT good for flowers!
The veggie side of things hasn’t really taken off as yet. Everything is on the cusp of going crazy. There are trays of seedlings, leafy greens in the ground and the first direct sown crops (carrots, beets, radishes etc) are now starting to push through. Everything is in dire need of watering most days, which takes up a lot of time.
BUT … exciting things are afoot. My CSA begins at the end of this month. I’ve got two new markets to head to, so I’ll be doing three markets a month and the farm stand can soon have vegetables too!
So that’s life. Hectic. Fun. Crazy. And Dry (please, we need rain!).