I have to admit I have become a sad old git. When I was young, what excited me were things like the sight of a pretty girl (one now sits at the end of the table), or a night out at the pub with the lads. What excites me most at the moment is my new three-way Westfalia drafting gate – or shedding, as we say over here.

In preparation for installing our new milking parlour, we visited several farms for ideas. When the subject of shedding gates came up, they nearly all admitted they had stopped using them due to unreliability. In spite of this, I was determined to have one. If it worked, it would be a great asset to grazing management in being able to shed out high-yielders for first bite.

I could stand there for hours just watching it work.

Such was my lack of faith in it to operate adequately that I even installed a manual shedding system. I am delighted to say (perhaps tempting fate here), I am delighted with the gate’s reliability.

I could stand there for hours just watching it work. Its success depends on a Texas gate which closes to stop the cow behind the identified one. It doesn’t open until the identified cow has cleared the race and the shedding gate is closed. The whole system is controlled by four infrared cameras and is a credit to its developers and manufacturers.

Joe Collingborn's new drafting gate.

Although expensive, it is definitely the best investment the farm has ever made. It allows us to send the high-yielders out to grass as they are milked. The stale milkers are let go at the end of milking. We are also able to shed for the vet and AI.

New parlour

We are settling into the new parlour. The cows seem to have learned the ropes quicker than me. Some early hiccups with the computer system have been ironed out, although this has made us very aware of how dependent we are on technology.

In the old parlour, it was pull a rope to open a gate and swing a lever for cake. Now if you push a wrong button, lights start flashing. My technical inability gives me cause for alarm.

I have yet to get to grips with the computer that controls it all, which sits in the corner of the farm office.

I do tend to treat it like an ancient Victorian aunt sat in the corner of the room, with whom I am reluctant to make acquaintance. Yet when it works, it makes milking a very enjoyable doddle of one and a half hours instead of a three hour sprint.

Cows have been out at grass for five weeks and are milking well, but my neighbours are still busy chain harrowing and rolling – old habits die hard. I see from the latest grass results that it has a dry matter of 21.4, CP of 20.7 and ME of 12.2.

Because it is such a dry time, I can see grass growth falling off and I can see us going back on to limited winter rations if rain doesn’t come soon.

General election dynamite

I have just heard the news that Theresa May has called a general election. This is political dynamite, political poker a potentially political suicide. It has the possibility of damaging our democratic system for years to come.

Many people who voted for a leader who was committed to remain in the EU may now turn to abstention or a fringe party. My Scottish farming friend tells me he is in a dilemma. During the Scottish referendum for independence, he voted to stay in the UK because David Cameron promised to stay in Europe. Now he is in the UK but out of Europe. He obviously feels cheated. You couldn’t make it up.

Cheap food policy

Another shining example are Welsh farmers, the majority of whom voted to leave. They have since woken up to the reality of soft promises or no promises at all on the single farm payment, with the emphasis moving firmly towards the environment rather than farming and a government determined to feed the nation from food stocks from around the world.

This was tried in the 1930s with disastrous results for British farming, causing the agricultural depression.

I for one am very fearful.

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