- Location
- Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk
It’s been another week of intense pressure, and it’s gonna keep me healthy, or put me under the sod. That last flock of ewes is finally gathered and clipped, several groups of beasts are sold, and another ‘spot’ of grass cut. This all sounds easy enough, but trust me on this, nothing is simple.
The bunch of ewes aren’t very far out over, but the terrain is, um, ‘testing’, with knee deep molinia grass, precipitous slopes, streams, bogs, and boulders the size of a Landrover. Not that I use one, but you can’t get a quad bike in amongst them, so it’s dog and stick work. And come the day, I spotted a ‘wool sheep’ and her lamb of a neighbours which had given him the slip, so I thought I’d grab her while I had the chance. And did they want to play ball? No they did not. He gathers on a quad, and they know to bolt down over where he can’t follow, along a narrow track through a treacherous bog on the side of the hill. I was wise to this, so Gyp and I legged it down through a clear patch of turf, to head them off. The problem? This grassy clear patch is a thin skin over a jumble of boulders, under which trickles the stream which feeds the bog. Hot footing it down across is running a serious risk of dropping into a hidden hole several feet deep, which would likely lead to the wet snapping sound of a middle aged ankle giving way, or knee being bent the wrong way. My neighbour is a pal, and he’s never shy to help me out, but wouldn’t it have been ironic to have come a cropper chasing his ewe? As it happened, we got her back with mine, and they came in fairly easily. Going back after lunch to fetch in 4-5 oddments the wrong side of the river took longer, especially when just a moments inattention let them slip past, and gain ½ a mile on us. I know they reckon the wool is worth a bit more again, but somehow I doubt if they’ll pay for gathering! They only had 1 lamb between them, on one of John’s ewes, but at least it was a ewe lamb. And I notice another was the mother of last year’s best tup lamb. I’ll let her get away with not coming back with a lamb this time, having fed last years until mid-November, and then getting on the wrong side of the river.
The yearling tup is destined to be sold in a month or two. I’ve decided I just can’t keep him, he’s so closely bred to the flock. I did work him on one group last fall, and didn’t pick him up til February, and he’s still grown on into a strapper. One very senior Dartmoor sheep man has seen him, and keeps asking if he can have a deal prior to sale. This can only be good sign! Stay posted John.
So we got those sheep clipped, and will likely get some store lambs sold off them while they’re held in.
Harvesting goes apace, Joe knocking down another 45 acres while we sheared. Unfortunately, this has hardly gone smoothly either. A sudden change in the forecast found me with my metaphoric draws down once more. I had to push on and bale some soggy green stuff here Saturday/Sunday, hoping the older crop ‘in country’ would turn up for hay. At the time of writing, it’s caught some serious rain, but is drying out again OK. The weeks score by Wednesday night should be another 450. It was while chewing my way through some on Sunday I was reminded of a conversation with young Steve the previous night- we’d run into each other at a boisterous YFC bash, at which I’m sadly now a sober chauffeuring Dad. Steve - pint in either hand- assured me that what I needed was one of these fangled jumbo rakes, like he and his Dad use. I’d row up these little fields up here in no time. Yeah right, Steve. Come Sunday, it was all I could do to bale at walking pace in the dense crop of soggy green stuff. It would’ve flown through the baler with another days sun, but I wasn’t going to get that. It only seemed to be ankle deep before Joe cut it, but still did 12-13 bales/acre. If we’d used a bigger rake…..well, I’d still be out there, trying to clear the blockages wouldn’t I?
Anyway, despite very trying weather and a heavy schedule, we’re moving forward, and so far I haven’t blow a fuse and needed to be hooked up to the machine that goes ping.
About the author
Originally published in The Western Morning News, these articles are reproduced for the enjoyment of TFF members World-wide by kind permission of the author Anton Coaker and the WMN
Anton Coaker is a fifth generation farmer keeping suckler cows and flocks of hill sheep high on the Forest of Dartmoor and running a hardwood and mobile sawmill.
A prodigious writer and regular correspondent for The Western Morning News, NFU and The Farming Forum, Anton’s second book “The Complete Bullocks” is available fromwww.anton-coaker.co.uk
The bunch of ewes aren’t very far out over, but the terrain is, um, ‘testing’, with knee deep molinia grass, precipitous slopes, streams, bogs, and boulders the size of a Landrover. Not that I use one, but you can’t get a quad bike in amongst them, so it’s dog and stick work. And come the day, I spotted a ‘wool sheep’ and her lamb of a neighbours which had given him the slip, so I thought I’d grab her while I had the chance. And did they want to play ball? No they did not. He gathers on a quad, and they know to bolt down over where he can’t follow, along a narrow track through a treacherous bog on the side of the hill. I was wise to this, so Gyp and I legged it down through a clear patch of turf, to head them off. The problem? This grassy clear patch is a thin skin over a jumble of boulders, under which trickles the stream which feeds the bog. Hot footing it down across is running a serious risk of dropping into a hidden hole several feet deep, which would likely lead to the wet snapping sound of a middle aged ankle giving way, or knee being bent the wrong way. My neighbour is a pal, and he’s never shy to help me out, but wouldn’t it have been ironic to have come a cropper chasing his ewe? As it happened, we got her back with mine, and they came in fairly easily. Going back after lunch to fetch in 4-5 oddments the wrong side of the river took longer, especially when just a moments inattention let them slip past, and gain ½ a mile on us. I know they reckon the wool is worth a bit more again, but somehow I doubt if they’ll pay for gathering! They only had 1 lamb between them, on one of John’s ewes, but at least it was a ewe lamb. And I notice another was the mother of last year’s best tup lamb. I’ll let her get away with not coming back with a lamb this time, having fed last years until mid-November, and then getting on the wrong side of the river.
The yearling tup is destined to be sold in a month or two. I’ve decided I just can’t keep him, he’s so closely bred to the flock. I did work him on one group last fall, and didn’t pick him up til February, and he’s still grown on into a strapper. One very senior Dartmoor sheep man has seen him, and keeps asking if he can have a deal prior to sale. This can only be good sign! Stay posted John.
So we got those sheep clipped, and will likely get some store lambs sold off them while they’re held in.
Harvesting goes apace, Joe knocking down another 45 acres while we sheared. Unfortunately, this has hardly gone smoothly either. A sudden change in the forecast found me with my metaphoric draws down once more. I had to push on and bale some soggy green stuff here Saturday/Sunday, hoping the older crop ‘in country’ would turn up for hay. At the time of writing, it’s caught some serious rain, but is drying out again OK. The weeks score by Wednesday night should be another 450. It was while chewing my way through some on Sunday I was reminded of a conversation with young Steve the previous night- we’d run into each other at a boisterous YFC bash, at which I’m sadly now a sober chauffeuring Dad. Steve - pint in either hand- assured me that what I needed was one of these fangled jumbo rakes, like he and his Dad use. I’d row up these little fields up here in no time. Yeah right, Steve. Come Sunday, it was all I could do to bale at walking pace in the dense crop of soggy green stuff. It would’ve flown through the baler with another days sun, but I wasn’t going to get that. It only seemed to be ankle deep before Joe cut it, but still did 12-13 bales/acre. If we’d used a bigger rake…..well, I’d still be out there, trying to clear the blockages wouldn’t I?
Anyway, despite very trying weather and a heavy schedule, we’re moving forward, and so far I haven’t blow a fuse and needed to be hooked up to the machine that goes ping.
About the author
Originally published in The Western Morning News, these articles are reproduced for the enjoyment of TFF members World-wide by kind permission of the author Anton Coaker and the WMN
Anton Coaker is a fifth generation farmer keeping suckler cows and flocks of hill sheep high on the Forest of Dartmoor and running a hardwood and mobile sawmill.
A prodigious writer and regular correspondent for The Western Morning News, NFU and The Farming Forum, Anton’s second book “The Complete Bullocks” is available fromwww.anton-coaker.co.uk