The year is continuing at a pace and although we enjoyed a fantastic spring in this part of Scotland, it has come back to bite us! However, I am an eternal optimist and find it helps the morale to try and focus on what positives can be found. Grass growth has (bar a blip in late September) continued well and we still have an average cover of over 2000KgDM/Ha on the farm.

We have worked hard to keep stock moving off the farm this year, firstly to protect our grass covers going in to winter, also, hopefully, to reduce the need for bought-in feeds and to help carry our ever-expanding stock numbers.

We do feel better prepared for winter this year with 27ha of grass shut off at the start of September to be used as deferred grazing post tupping. These fields will be paddock grazed by around a third of the flock with the remainder going on to 3.7Ha of kale, which will be supplemented with silage and some on to other grass fields. This system will allow us to shut up our lambing fields in mid-December and hopefully not return to them until a week pre-lambing.

Fat lambs continue to be sold, however, we were struggling to get the required finish on them at grass so we brought the biggest 120 in to the shed a fortnight ago. They are on ad-lib hoppers, which is always a bit scary when you keep counting in your head how much it’s costing you; however it has had the desired effect with over half of them fat after the fortnight gaining 0.2Kg/day on average.

Decision

We have made the decision to shift to one lambing this year; the early lambers did leave a higher margin this year before labour costs were added, but taking into consideration other factors such as other opportunities for the shed space, limited labour and a better work/life balance we have decided to lamb everything outside in April. Staying motivated for a nine-week lambing was tough, and April ties in well with school holidays and therefore a greatly increased workforce!

We have purchased 50 extra ewes this year to boost numbers after having a good clear out of older ewes and, much to Aileen’s dismay, we have drawn out 75 ewe lambs to tup. Apparently I swore I would never lamb hoggs again a couple of years ago, however, our Aberfield hoggs have grown well and I couldn’t help drafting 75 off that were over 40kg at the start of the month to run with the new Highlander tup. We have just returned from a family holiday to Aviemore; we had a great time and now that the kids are getting a bit older and slightly less devil-like you could almost call it relaxing. Anna, our youngest, has started school this year and it has really hit me just how quick time is passing and although we have had to put everything in to building the business over the past five years we are now keen to readdress our priorities a bit. We all get caught up with the daily grind at times but a break away and a change of scenery makes the world of difference to the whole family and to your motivation and ability to run the business better on your return.