DEAR SIR: I was recently reading the article: “What age should you cast a cow?”

Why should anyone cast a cow if she is healthy and drops a good, saleable calf at 10 years – this cow is in her prime.

We work with the most scorned breed of Scottish cattle, the Highland, which we cross with a white Shorthorn and we tend to get a roan-coated calf.

Over the last two years our males sold for an average of £700 and the females for £720 at less than a year old.

We never feed concentrates to our cows, only silage, and they are outwintered beside the sea so snow is never a problem.

Our cows are small compared with the 670kg mentioned in the article. We couldn’t afford to keep cows of this size, our biggest one probably weighs around 400kg.

The last old cows that left here was 190-months-old (approx 15), but we have had older ones.

If beef farmers are casting cows at 10, no wonder they are losing £150 a cow.

Get good Highland cows, they will cross well with the Shorthorn and with most breeds – in my youth they used to cross Ayrshire cows with the Highland and you got a good cow with plenty of milk. One that would thrive in the harsh conditions of the Outer Hebrides.