Hill farm tender

LancsFerns

New Member
Hi guys,

Looking for some (very) rough guidance re: what people are paying in the North West on Grade 5 hill land per acre.
In decent order with fences/walls/water - in fact, there's plenty of that. A lot of it (>70%) is bog/mire/fen, so pretty soggy with not much cutting space.
Lots of SSSI/other designations, landlord is pretty involved, requires careful management etc. A handful of traditional buildings, no scope to add . Stocking rates would probably have to be minimal.
Just looking for a steer from folks more experienced than myself.

Cheers!
 

steveR

Member
Mixed Farmer
Hi guys,

Looking for some (very) rough guidance re: what people are paying in the North West on Grade 5 hill land per acre.
In decent order with fences/walls/water - in fact, there's plenty of that. A lot of it (>70%) is bog/mire/fen, so pretty soggy with not much cutting space.
Lots of SSSI/other designations, landlord is pretty involved, requires careful management etc. A handful of traditional buildings, no scope to add . Stocking rates would probably have to be minimal.
Just looking for a steer from folks more experienced than myself.

Cheers!
Sounds like your role will be as a low paid, land manager!

I will wait to hear from folks like @Wood field
 

steveR

Member
Mixed Farmer
Everyone is againts us even inbye farmes to degree , few years ago was at a meeting and general opinion among the combine classes was just plant all the hill farms with trees …..
There are no doubt some that subscribe to that small minded viewpoint, but as someone farming close to Wales, we have always traded with our Hill neighbours, be it stock moving here for finishing, or straw, fodder and grain going the other way. It's an integrated system and has been for generations.

Possibly different for someone farming hundreds of arable acres, but the importance of Hill used to be far more widely known. I have known 3 farmers over the years, who bought upland farms to complement their lowland arable enterprises, but I have no idea if these sort of enterprises are still viable?
 
Last edited:

d williams

Member
Hi guys,

Looking for some (very) rough guidance re: what people are paying in the North West on Grade 5 hill land per acre.
In decent order with fences/walls/water - in fact, there's plenty of that. A lot of it (>70%) is bog/mire/fen, so pretty soggy with not much cutting space.
Lots of SSSI/other designations, landlord is pretty involved, requires careful management etc. A handful of traditional buildings, no scope to add . Stocking rates would probably have to be minimal.
Just looking for a steer from folks more experienced than myself.

Cheers!
40k year plus a house and vehicle off the owner
 

Welderloon

Member
Trade
If landlord is claiming all the payments really he should be paying you too graze or atleast free… can’t see how a hill farm would stack up without the payments
This 👆
They need you & your stock to meet their targets & also because they do not have the experience of owning livestock & do not want the expense of running livestock from scratch.
Whatever you choose to do research & plan it wisely, you will be no more than a hired in grazer so make sure your end of the stick is nice & clean.
The rules & hoops created that you will have to jump through will quickly grow tiresome so make sure everything is in your favour.
 
It's currently in a basic HLS but we would look to uplift asap to CS higher tier if we could.
So from what you say it sounds like its the NT farm between conniston and Windemere -

Its pretty simple...

House rent is worth between 10-12k

The farm itself is a loss maker - the NT are very involved land owners and in all honesty - your a farm manager not a tennant farmer on many of their farms -

The stocking rates etc mean that you should assume £0-£1 is the per acre per year rent viable on that ground....

Remember if theirs a deadline for taking stock off an important sssi pasture, bog or hill.... no matter how sh!t the weather, how little forage you have made and how little grass cover you have on your inbye mowing fields.... you have to take them off.......

This traps you buying in food, or looosing stock, on an already stretched farm (in terms of stocking).

Also low density farms dont have a corresponding reduction in labour..., the opposite in fact.... going onto a 300 acre hill to find 200 sheep is quite time consuming and frustrating compared to fetching 600 down or moving 150 from a ten acre field.....

That farms income will really be dependant on SFI, and say 1/3 of SFI + House to be a fair rental value.

You can then set youself the challenge of making the hill farm break even..... That farm in particular might just provided a minimum wage income for one person working full time after rent.... but it will be high risk and long hours.
 
I’d get kicked off there is absolutely no doubt about it
the stocking rates theyre on about are the very reason its got a bracken problem on the land.... and the hillside in the middle block is too steep to do anything mechanical on it.....
Its an insult to the men who cleared the land with sythes in centurys by, and it needs heavy cattle work in april - june to keep the bracken down, or someone to knapsack MCPA but that has its own issues.
 

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