Hi everyone, my dad and I have a mixed 400 acre farm in Norfolk and he is retiring (I think he means not doing so much) next year.
I enjoy doing the majority of the arable work and amongst other things in the winter help dad with his 80ish beef cattle. The cattle are bought in as cheaply as possible at around a year old using a dealer around October time. After having the odd one or two rigs/bulls castrated we dehorn as needed and feed through the winter on home grown rolled barley, fodder beet and round bale silage. They are turned out to graze on the 60 acres of marshes in the summer to put on frame and then finished in the yards the following winter on more barley/silage.
Reading this back it doesn't seem too bad, it just looks like we are too tight to buy decent cattle and a proper ration!
Here's the thing... The buildings and open yards are so old and inaccessible that it takes two of us to litter down as the yards open onto the road. One opens the gate and the other drives in with silage or 2 round bales of straw on the loader to roll out and spread with pitch forks. 4 yards usually needing 6 to 8 bales a day.
Barley is rolled by a tractor powered roller mill and it was only last year that he tied an auger up to fill rather than use his trusty hod/bushel. The meal is shoveled away from the mill with a snow shovel! Oh and access to the shed with the trailer load of barley/wheat is through the cattle yard needing someone to open the gate.
It gets worse.
The rolled barley is carried into the yard with the afore mentioned hods to be tipped into oak mangers or bings as we call them. Two yards are just a heavy door away from the mill but the other yard and shed has to be transported on a wheelbarrow/trolly 4 hods perched on top of each other.
The more I write the more 1950s it sounds...
I almost forgot we feed twice a day and both times the fodder beet are forked off a 3t trailer that has been reversed into each yard requiring a gate opener.
I enjoy keeping the cattle but am not sure how to alter this system to be able to do it on my own. I think I'll take some pictures of the yards to see if anyone has any ideas.
Sorry for the waffley post.
I enjoy doing the majority of the arable work and amongst other things in the winter help dad with his 80ish beef cattle. The cattle are bought in as cheaply as possible at around a year old using a dealer around October time. After having the odd one or two rigs/bulls castrated we dehorn as needed and feed through the winter on home grown rolled barley, fodder beet and round bale silage. They are turned out to graze on the 60 acres of marshes in the summer to put on frame and then finished in the yards the following winter on more barley/silage.
Reading this back it doesn't seem too bad, it just looks like we are too tight to buy decent cattle and a proper ration!
Here's the thing... The buildings and open yards are so old and inaccessible that it takes two of us to litter down as the yards open onto the road. One opens the gate and the other drives in with silage or 2 round bales of straw on the loader to roll out and spread with pitch forks. 4 yards usually needing 6 to 8 bales a day.
Barley is rolled by a tractor powered roller mill and it was only last year that he tied an auger up to fill rather than use his trusty hod/bushel. The meal is shoveled away from the mill with a snow shovel! Oh and access to the shed with the trailer load of barley/wheat is through the cattle yard needing someone to open the gate.
It gets worse.
The rolled barley is carried into the yard with the afore mentioned hods to be tipped into oak mangers or bings as we call them. Two yards are just a heavy door away from the mill but the other yard and shed has to be transported on a wheelbarrow/trolly 4 hods perched on top of each other.
The more I write the more 1950s it sounds...
I almost forgot we feed twice a day and both times the fodder beet are forked off a 3t trailer that has been reversed into each yard requiring a gate opener.
I enjoy keeping the cattle but am not sure how to alter this system to be able to do it on my own. I think I'll take some pictures of the yards to see if anyone has any ideas.
Sorry for the waffley post.