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For every edition of the local village newsletter I write an article about the farm and what's been happening with the animals and how the surrounding countryside is changing. When sitting down writing one afternoon it dawned on me that previous visitors and those that are thinking of coming to Rhydhowell Farm, to stay or just to wander round the nature trail, may be interested in reading it.
On The Farm
12/07
Happy Christmas everybody, the sun is shining and all is right with the world – well in this part of it anyway!
At long last it has been possible to sell most of the cattle after being under restrictions of one sort or another for nearly two years. This has played havoc with the overdraft but at last there seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel and the New Year is almost here.
There are now six cows, a bull and six calves left making the yard look pretty empty after last winter when there were forty seven cattle. Consequently the amount of silage used has dropped from two bales a day to half a bale a day and they need cleaning far less frequently. For the first time in several years there will be no need to buy in extra feed. The mild autumn helped a lot as they were able to stay outside nearly two months longer than normal.
Four of the calves are bulls so the plan is to sell these as stores in the spring and to keep the heifers as replacement for the two cows that are now coming up to twelve years old and starting to show their age.
The rams went in with the sheep at the end of September so should lamb towards the end of February, this year as there is the shed space we might well bring them in at night as this makes life so much easier than messing about outside in the cold and wet trying to work by torchlight.
There have been new arrivals on the farm, in the form of four hens and a cockerel to replace those that the fox had in the summer, at the moment they are in the isolation box as the chicken shed needs repairing and moving, hopefully to a position were there can be an outside run. It may seem a strange thing but with all the selling of different livestock of the farm the thing that I really missed was the chickens – so far the cockerel hasn’t found his voice and when he does perhaps my attitude will change.
The fencing contractor arrived in September and we went mad and finished all the fencing on the farm and made all the gates hang properly on their hinges, it was hard work as all the strainer posts in the top two fields above the woods had to be drilled, in places straight into the rock, but with an early start and a late finish we got them all done in a day. We also repaired all the other fences so now we have the luxury of being able to put animals in a field and they will still be there in the morning!
The hedges have been cut and the next job is to replant the gaps, and put up some more nest boxes, there are also several low branches that need cutting back so that the tractors can pass under them without knocking the exhausts off.
It has been a funny season as far as nature is concerned – there are very few berries on the holly trees and yet there were really good crops of apples and acorns, while there are primroses in flower in several places and one of the roses still has flowers on it.
The birds are feeding on the feeders but not in anything like the numbers that usually come, even though we have had several days of hard frosts and apart from a little Goldcrest that you could hear more than see – nothing else out of the ordinary.
The Red Kites and the Buzzards are around and in the last couple of days, a Sparrow hawk and Kestrel have been visiting the farmyard along with a cock Pheasant but, so far this winter I haven’t seen any Woodcock, Snipe or Mallard.
Well, that’s all for now, a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all, John
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