We write monthly for the magazine Bridport Times. To see this article as originally published, view the pages on Issue.

For us April is all about lambing, about new lives blinking at the world for the first time, learning to stand and to skip and taking joy in exploring it all.

We lamb in Spring to coincide with when the grass is rich and growing most strongly. Many farmers organise the date of their lambing for the winter and have the ewes indoors when they lamb. This is because there is a price premium for lamb ready for the Easter market, and also because being indoors makes it easier to keep an eye on any ewes that might need help. Indeed, we used to do this ourselves, starting lambing in January, taking shifts in the lambing barn to ensure that help was on hand if it was needed 24/7. But years ago we decided to change to April, using the warmer weather, the spring grass and longer days to lamb out of doors as deer and many other animals naturally do – and we’ve never looked back.

We like it because Continue reading “April on the farm (Bridport Times, April 2018)”

We write monthly for the magazine Bridport Times. To see this article as originally published, view the pages on Issue.

Taking on a National Trust tenancy of 200 acres immediately adjacent to our farm 20 years ago was a chance for us to expand our arable production. Perhaps we should have been warned by the name of the farm, Labour in Vain, and better remembered the history of it: more than 30 years of continuous intensive grain production had eroded the top-soil and lost organic matter so that over most of the area the soil had become a glue-like clay.

We knew it would be difficult to improve, but taking on this land meant we could increase the arable rotation from the 20 acres we had on the home farm so we were keen to try. It has worked for us in many ways Continue reading “Soils and Spring (Bridport Times, March 2018)”