New entrants / post entry / building the future of our industry.

M-J-G · Mar 22, 2022

When I worked on a research unit, if we assisted a ewe we had to describe why as well as log details of what drugs were used as well as the basic record keeping like date, time, weights.

We used to get young clowns who wanted to assist sheep that didn't need it, but after they did the paperwork afterwards they started to leave them alone.
I guess doing paperwork doesn't make you look like a hero.

It used to make me chuckle when you saw the number of assisted lambing drop after a couple of days.

Gulli · Mar 22, 2022

CopperBeech said:
I can’t see where it’s gone now, but @Electricfencer mentioned earlier on, the weird obsession with lambing sheep. Seems to me that a hell of a lot of lambs which don’t need pulling get pulled. So many videos on social media of people lambing normally presented; normal size lambs which aren’t yellow. Lambs which id hazard a guess the ewe would have lambed fine herself. It seems that people want to pull lbs because if they don’t they can’t take photos / video. This then leads on to the idea that most lambs need pulling and but lambs are a good thing. Like these below I just saw now! Not sure many of us wants lambs like that ! View attachment 1024177

Agree with that, though as I've found this year trying to teach my partner how to lamb it's much easier to learn how to lamb the ones that need it if you've built up confidence lambing the normally presented ones.
So long as you aren't ripping them out too soon and trying to lamb every single ewe I think it's justified in some cases. Not just for the camera though!

CopperBeech · Mar 22, 2022

Gulli said:
Agree with that, though as I've found this year trying to teach my partner how to lamb it's much easier to learn how to lamb the ones that need it if you've built up confidence lambing the normally presented ones.
So long as you aren't ripping them out too soon and trying to lamb every single ewe I think it's justified in some cases. Not just for the camera though!

Aye I get the learning thing and I’ve done the same to teach a young student. However I personally think it’s a bit immoral to wrestle down and shove your hands into an animal in Labour if it’s not needed!

Here’s one for you - the lad who works for me always goes off lambing for other folk before we do our lambing as we are quiet. Last couple years he’s been going to a large local established farm, family farm, plenty of money, lambing about 800 ewes inside. Respected both locally and further afield as good farmers apparently, very active on Instagram, get sponsorship etc etc.

Anyway...... so when a ewe puts her water bag out, that’s the sign to go in and lamb her, no ifs, no buts. If she isn’t open then it’s ringwomb and you jab her with oxytocin. I sh*t you not. Also singles, twins and triplets all get a kilo a head a day of cake. 6 staff on at one time, mainly so farm owners kids have time to post on Instagram eyx. Obviously no other staff are mentioned or shown. Singles that big and pulled that early you get broken legs and ribs etc.

Oh and the lad who works for me showed them how to skin a lamb and do a Foster ( I taught him) and it was like someone had shown them the world was round.

And I can’t say too much more but the owner is someone who was held up as a very good sheep farmer and policy informer.

And here’s another one - NSA young ambassador program...... I’ve had dealings with three, sacked two for gross negligence and lying resulting in animal cruelty and dead sheep and my dealings with the third involved a lot of dead sheep, rspca, trading standards, huge unpaid bills etc (we were the ones sorting the sheep out in the aftermath)

So yer I’m a bit cynical.

Jonp · Mar 22, 2022

CopperBeech said:
Aye I get the learning thing and I’ve done the same to teach a young student. However I personally think it’s a bit immoral to wrestle down and shove your hands into an animal in Labour if it’s not needed!

Here’s one for you - the lad who works for me always goes off lambing for other folk before we do our lambing as we are quiet. Last couple years he’s been going to a large local established farm, family farm, plenty of money, lambing about 800 ewes inside. Respected both locally and further afield as good farmers apparently, very active on Instagram, get sponsorship etc etc.

Anyway...... so when a ewe puts her water bag out, that’s the sign to go in and lamb her, no ifs, no buts. If she isn’t open then it’s ringwomb and you jab her with oxytocin. I sh*t you not. Also singles, twins and triplets all get a kilo a head a day of cake. 6 staff on at one time, mainly so farm owners kids have time to post on Instagram eyx. Obviously no other staff are mentioned or shown. Singles that big and pulled that early you get broken legs and ribs etc.

Oh and the lad who works for me showed them how to skin a lamb and do a Foster ( I taught him) and it was like someone had shown them the world was round.

And I can’t say too much more but the owner is someone who was held up as a very good sheep farmer and policy informer.

And here’s another one - NSA young ambassador program...... I’ve had dealings with three, sacked two for gross negligence and lying resulting in animal cruelty and dead sheep and my dealings with the third involved a lot of dead sheep, rspca, trading standards, huge unpaid bills etc (we were the ones sorting the sheep out in the aftermath)

So yer I’m a bit cynical.

What a terrible way to treat sheep..it's almost like factory farming them to get the biggest lambs possible with scant regard for the ewes welfare.

Benn · Mar 22, 2022

“Anyway...... so when a ewe puts her water bag out, that’s the sign to go in and lamb her, no ifs, no buts. If she isn’t open then it’s ringwomb and you jab her with oxytocin. I sh*t you not. Also singles, twins and triplets all get a kilo a head a day of cake. 6 staff on at one time, mainly so farm owners kids have time to post on Instagram eyx. Obviously no other staff are mentioned or shown. Singles that big and pulled that early you get broken legs and ribs etc.”

if that bit is true,
what a backwards and unnecessary way to run things,
Also ,got be taking a whack on there profits ,labour to pull every lamb and the feed cost trying to produce big lambs at birth?

M-J-G · Mar 22, 2022

Anymulewilldo said:
Giving lambs cuddliest and taking selfie’s with them
Leave the damn things on the ewes! “If that ewe rejects the lamb because it smells of you now. You’re getting an arse kicking” the amount of students that have too be told several times!!! Always get 1 a year more interested in posing and cuddling lambs that getting on. While the others work like trojans!

To be fair, if a ewe rejects a lamb because someone has held it, she should get a bullet for being so fickle, along with the student for being that stupid, along with the farmer for not keeping the student busy enough.

What happens on our farms while we are in charge is down to us, I'm pretty sure anyone coming to help me doesn't put photos of assisted lambing etc. on social media as they know what I'd be like if I saw it.

Gulli · Mar 22, 2022

CopperBeech said:
Aye I get the learning thing and I’ve done the same to teach a young student. However I personally think it’s a bit immoral to wrestle down and shove your hands into an animal in Labour if it’s not needed!

Here’s one for you - the lad who works for me always goes off lambing for other folk before we do our lambing as we are quiet. Last couple years he’s been going to a large local established farm, family farm, plenty of money, lambing about 800 ewes inside. Respected both locally and further afield as good farmers apparently, very active on Instagram, get sponsorship etc etc.

Anyway...... so when a ewe puts her water bag out, that’s the sign to go in and lamb her, no ifs, no buts. If she isn’t open then it’s ringwomb and you jab her with oxytocin. I sh*t you not. Also singles, twins and triplets all get a kilo a head a day of cake. 6 staff on at one time, mainly so farm owners kids have time to post on Instagram eyx. Obviously no other staff are mentioned or shown. Singles that big and pulled that early you get broken legs and ribs etc.

Oh and the lad who works for me showed them how to skin a lamb and do a Foster ( I taught him) and it was like someone had shown them the world was round.

And I can’t say too much more but the owner is someone who was held up as a very good sheep farmer and policy informer.

And here’s another one - NSA young ambassador program...... I’ve had dealings with three, sacked two for gross negligence and lying resulting in animal cruelty and dead sheep and my dealings with the third involved a lot of dead sheep, rspca, trading standards, huge unpaid bills etc (we were the ones sorting the sheep out in the aftermath)

So yer I’m a bit cynical.

Don't get me wrong it's a very hands off approach here normally, just there's a case for it is all I'm saying. She's learning fast this year as I did some knee ligaments the day before I started

Regards your other bit, I'd say that's borderline cruelty but it's definitely ignorant, if love to say it will bite them in the pocket eventually but those types are usually the ones that spend their lives preaching about how we should all be paid more for our produce and not have to change anything that we do

Anymulewilldo · Mar 22, 2022

M-J-G said:
To be fair, if a ewe rejects a lamb because someone has held it, she should get a bullet for being so fickle, along with the student for being that stupid, along with the farmer for not keeping the student busy enough.

What happens on our farms while we are in charge is down to us, I'm pretty sure anyone coming to help me doesn't put photos of assisted lambing etc. on social media as they know what I'd be like if I saw it.

Rarely do they actually reject them. I just tell them that too make sure it doesn’t happen

although we did have a small lamb with a black spot on its nose a few years back that did end up being rejected. Every time I turned my back they were cuddling it “but it’s soooo cute!” I took it off them when they brought it too me as the ewe was batting it. Rollicked them both for not doing as they were told and this lamb would have too be knocked now as I don’t have time too feed cades. Sent them both too the house while I did it. In reality I wandered down too where I’d just put a mule Hogg in the adopter, popped the lamb down, drank straight away. Took them the rest of the day too make eye contact with me and 2 days too notice that the lamb was in the other shed in the adopters.

needless too say they left the little mite alone then.

CopperBeech · Mar 22, 2022

M-J-G said:
To be fair, if a ewe rejects a lamb because someone has held it, she should get a bullet for being so fickle, along with the student for being that stupid, along with the farmer for not keeping the student busy enough.

What happens on our farms while we are in charge is down to us, I'm pretty sure anyone coming to help me doesn't put photos of assisted lambing etc. on social media as they know what I'd be like if I saw it.

Very true. I had the pleasure of one famous Instagram shepherdess over lambing. She wasn’t bad, but she wasn’t particularly special. However she did give the other members of the lambing staff an unbelievably slick in how to post things on social media, timings, photography tips etc. Very interesting, and one of the other folk in the shed at that point learnt those lessons and also went on to begin to achieve social media fame. The famous social media shepherdess didn’t make it through lambing though, apparently I was the worst person she’d ever worked for. I think that means the most honest

CopperBeech · Mar 22, 2022

Gulli said:
Don't get me wrong it's a very hands off approach here normally, just there's a case for it is all I'm saying. She's learning fast this year as I did some knee ligaments the day before I started

Regards your other bit, I'd say that's borderline cruelty but it's definitely ignorant, if love to say it will bite them in the pocket eventually but those types are usually the ones that spend their lives preaching about how we should all be paid more for our produce and not have to change anything that we do

That is just about the nail on the head mate!

ImLost · Mar 22, 2022

ImLost said:
@CopperBeech - as a new entrant, how should I be going about getting into farming?

The biggest barrier for me is land.

Blood, sweat, toil, tears and money been put into finding it and feel like I'm getting nowhere.

Very definitely first generation, which doesn't help, but isn't "everyone wanting new, young entrants"?

Or anyone other than @CopperBeech - genuinely interested what I should be doing better. Around here it's mostly older farmers or 2nd/3rd/4th etc. generations hanging on, whether the are making much money or not. Getting a foot in the door is nigh on impossible.

SteveHants · Mar 22, 2022

CopperBeech said:
Very true. I had the pleasure of one famous Instagram shepherdess over lambing. She wasn’t bad, but she wasn’t particularly special. However she did give the other members of the lambing staff an unbelievably slick in how to post things on social media, timings, photography tips etc. Very interesting, and one of the other folk in the shed at that point learnt those lessons and also went on to begin to achieve social media fame. The famous social media shepherdess didn’t make it through lambing though, apparently I was the worst person she’d ever worked for. I think that means the most honest

I feel like it's a good skill to have in the modern world.
However, I'm very bad at it, especially given that, working with young people, I should probably have a clue about "famous insta shepherds" but I haven't got a clue....

spin cycle · Mar 22, 2022

Jockers84 said:
I'm sure there will plenty on here that would consider this scenario enjoyable.

i'm still trying to work out who owns the farm :scratchhead:

spin cycle · Mar 22, 2022

Nithsdale Farmer said:
Are you prepared to do anything to get farming...

View attachment 1024080

thats for metal detecting surely

Gulli · Mar 22, 2022

ImLost said:
Or anyone other than @CopperBeech - genuinely interested what I should be doing better. Around here it's mostly older farmers or 2nd/3rd/4th etc. generations hanging on, whether the are making much money or not. Getting a foot in the door is nigh on impossible.

Be prepared to move if the right place comes up

CopperBeech · Mar 23, 2022

ImLost said:
@CopperBeech - as a new entrant, how should I be going about getting into farming?

The biggest barrier for me is land.

Blood, sweat, toil, tears and money been put into finding it and feel like I'm getting nowhere.

Very definitely first generation, which doesn't help, but isn't "everyone wanting new, young entrants"?

I’m not sure I can tell you how to do it, I’m not sure I know, or if there is ‘a way’. There are likely many ways, which are all a combination of persistence and good luck.

But I’ll tell you a little of my journey, and apologise for those who’ve heard it before. But it might offer some kind of insight.

I think the biggest barrier for most is land, access to land and some form of security of tenure on that land.

I grew up in rural Wales, in the land of sheep. My old man kept sheep on a few bits of rented grazing when I was a kid alongside a full time job and other hobbies. It was a good first introduction, i learnt about sheep and about work and I think, although I didn’t realise then, a bit about work / life balance. Anyway, one day foot and mouth came and the sheep went and that was the end of that.

life went on, I always messed about farms with mates, more into hunting than farming but always around it. Moved away, travelled etc. Eventually came back to the UK, to Wales. Got a job working with kids in a school, ended up keepering part time, then more keepering and a bit of working with kids, and a little bit of farming. I bought a pig and some piglets and negotiated the use of a field full of brambles off an old man in the local village.

I reared a few pigs, sold some wieners, sold some boxed pork, some sausages, bred a few more pigs, got some chickens and ducks etc. Then I decided it was about time I got some sheep as that was my main interest, the estate I keepered on had 800 ewes and I was helping a lot around with them out of season. So I managed to rent a few fields off an old lady, via a lot of door knocking. I went to see a certain Mr white, and I ended up with a few wool shedders. I looked at the sheep one day and thought, well if I’m going to take time off to lamb sheep etc I might as well make it worth while. I went to the bank, got a personal loan for £10,000 and went and bought 100 exlana ewes off Tim, so now I had about 120 or something like that. No dog, no quad, no fencing machine, a Ford Focus estate

and a stick.

I lambed the sheep, it worked out ok, I could borrow a dog called Bug off the shepherd at the estate I keepered when sh!t got tough. There were tears and there was laughter. Anyway, this went on for a while, I bought a pup one day for £150 and trained it and she was real good. I started to do a bit of contract shepherding.

To cut a long story short, I met someone one day at a ram sale and got asked to go look at a shepherding job on an estate down south, I went down and within a week or two I was driving back and forth to get the work done there, and shortly after I left my best ewes with my old man to check, took my dog and went south. I moved into a house with no carpets or curtains and slept in a sleeping bag on the floor with the dog to start with.

I worked like a c*nt. The sheep got better and it was a great learning curve, a big flock of 1500 to start, which at its highest went to 3200, but sat around 2500 mostly. I learnt a lot about grass and regenerative farming and electric fencing and chasing big mobs of sheep on your own. After my first winter my ewes came down to lamb and I scratched about building my sheep on bits of rented grazing while farming the others.

I got more contract shepherding work, built up my own flock and also started taking tack sheep. Things were good and bad, I learnt a lot about life, and people and sheep. At one point I had staff, 8-10,000 ewes about the place I was looking after and I pretty much had a mental breakdown, was a c*nt to everyone around me and just became a very angry, stressed human being. One day I had a bit of a wake up call and I cut right back, back to the start, looking after 1500 ewes for the original farm I came down to, and farming a few hundred of my own.

Long story short we eventually sold the sheep belonging to the farm and I put 1200 of my ewes in their place. That was good, but a change in farm direction meant the ewes had to move off. I sold some and cut down to 850. Got another farm to keep them on. Now that’s getting rewilded and we are getting the boot and I’m about to lamb the ewes and then look to relocate them and myself two and a half hours away and live in a caravan with half of my dogs, while my extremely patient and understanding Mrs lives where we currently do and keeps things running here, with the other half of the dogs and a full time job as a police officer. I am extremely lucky that someone has reached out and that a situation has arisen where we can work together in a mutually beneficial way which will advance both of our flocks. But it’s going to be tough!

I’ve skipped over the bit about the ten year tenancy on a farm they sold six months after we moved in and we got kicked out the farm and house, or various other stressful clamities and loss of ground. And the enzo abortion storm that killed hundreds of lambs.

So.... what have I learnt?

I don’t really know, but one thing is, if you’re starting from scratch, start it right from the start, get the right sheep, the right system, do the hard work then, before you have a lot of sheep. If nothing else, you will have a desirable thing, a functioning flock of high merit. No one likes lame, skinny, rank looking sheep on their place and no one wants to partner with someone whose losing money.

And some other things ......

An understanding partner who supports what you do is incredibly important. I am truly blessed. Make time for them and realise as someone wise once told me “there is no point building a castle to live in on your own”.

Good dogs make a good shepherd. Look after your dogs.

Good staff in ag are hard to come by. Lots of people want to go it alone but there are some great operators out there crying out for reliable staff. Many of those people would probably be open to a partnership and may be a better bet than a wealthy land owner with no real interest in stock farming.

Ultimately it is not easy and it never has been and never will be. Lots of people want it or think they want it and only some follow it all the way through. There are lots of barriers but there are lots of opportunities out there for the right people I think. But there isn’t something for everyone and you have to be in the top %, work your arse off, be willing to take some knock backs, have a sense of humour, do a bit of networking and be very lucky.

But at the end of the day whether you get to where you want or not, it’s an adventure, and life is all about about having adventures.

spin cycle · Mar 23, 2022

ImLost said:
Or anyone other than @CopperBeech - genuinely interested what I should be doing better. Around here it's mostly older farmers or 2nd/3rd/4th etc. generations hanging on, whether the are making much money or not. Getting a foot in the door is nigh on impossible.

if you're not fixed up by the time i've had enough you can come see me

edit...i'll even throw in an olg git who'll wander around telling you 'you're doing it wrong'

DanM · Mar 23, 2022

ImLost said:
Or anyone other than @CopperBeech - genuinely interested what I should be doing better. Around here it's mostly older farmers or 2nd/3rd/4th etc. generations hanging on, whether the are making much money or not. Getting a foot in the door is nigh on impossible.

It depends partly on how you define “getting into farming”? Some would claim keeping 5 sheep and a few chickens and their in.
However if your referring to earning a full time living from farming activities, or specifically sheep, then I would advise contracting. Anything and everything. Shepherding, tractor driving, relief milking, tb-testing, cattle work etc etc. Aim being to work and meet as many farmers/landowners as possible.
This allows you to build a reputation and gets your name out there. It allows you to communicate what your building and where your going and sets cogs whirring, as people like to help people, and especially people they know.
…You can of course attempt to do all this on instagram with photos of cuddling collies, lambs, wearing latest ridgeline, however most grazing opportunities are never advertised, and farmers/landowners/agents who offer grazing, don’t do it through social media, they do it through word of mouth and on personal recommendation.

Benn · Mar 23, 2022

ImLost said:
Or anyone other than @CopperBeech - genuinely interested what I should be doing better. Around here it's mostly older farmers or 2nd/3rd/4th etc. generations hanging on, whether the are making much money or not. Getting a foot in the door is nigh on impossible.

Whats your goal?
To Keep a few around a full time job or go full time and make living from farming?

Estate fencing. · Mar 23, 2022

DanM said:
It depends partly on how you define “getting into farming”? Some would claim keeping 5 sheep and a few chickens and their in.
However if your referring to earning a full time living from farming activities, or specifically sheep, then I would advise contracting. Anything and everything. Shepherding, tractor driving, relief milking, tb-testing, cattle work etc etc. Aim being to work and meet as many farmers/landowners as possible.
This allows you to build a reputation and gets your name out there. It allows you to communicate what your building and where your going and sets cogs whirring, as people like to help people, and especially people they know.
…You can of course attempt to do all this on instagram with photos of cuddling collies, lambs, wearing latest ridgeline, however most grazing opportunities are never advertised, and farmers/landowners/agents who offer grazing, don’t do it through social media, they do it through word of mouth and on personal recommendation.

100%, you have to make yourself in the right place at the right time and that not sat at home looking for farms to rent.

New entrants / post entry / building the future of our industry.

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100% I’ve had enough of farming!

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