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

Tim W

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Wiltshire
Be prepared to move if the right place comes up
This is so true---i have put young shepherds in touch with good share farming opportunities only for them to reject the deal because it would mean moving from the home farm where (to quote the shepherds)
  • Dad is always ruling the roost
  • There is no chance to expand
  • Land is too expensive to rent
The ties to home often outweigh all common sense
 

unlacedgecko

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Fife
This is so true---i have put young shepherds in touch with good share farming opportunities only for them to reject the deal because it would mean moving from the home farm where (to quote the shepherds)
  • Dad is always ruling the roost
  • There is no chance to expand
  • Land is too expensive to rent
The ties to home often outweigh all common sense

If you come across anymore I'm more than happy to move.
 

JP1

Member
Livestock Farmer
I suppose the only danger is when people confuse the fact that it is actually two different industries..... and begin to ask the folk who make a living from social media to make decisions which impact upon the lives of those who make a living from farming. Maybe?!?
If one social media follower in a 100 buys an 1/8 beef box once a year, it makes sense to build a big following
 

bendigeidfran

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cei newydd
This is so true---i have put young shepherds in touch with good share farming opportunities only for them to reject the deal because it would mean moving from the home farm where (to quote the shepherds)
  • Dad is always ruling the roost
  • There is no chance to expand
  • Land is too expensive to rent
The ties to home often outweigh all common sense
Moving is not for everyone, i worked as a sheperd for a very succsesfull farmer and he moved quite a bit before he finaly setteld down.
He told me that he never feels as if he belongs anywere, and the children said they hated moving quite often. Son told me he can make friends quite easily but does not have real mates.
Iv'e been on a few farming trips and seen opportunites else were, i think i value being part of my local community, having friends and family to help when you need them
As for new entrants in to the industry my oldest boy makes a good living off sheep, but he only owns 150, he has a shearing and scanning buisness and helps out on two other farms rest of the year.
He is very keen to farm more land/ sheep of his own, i've told him to be very carefull with the calculator.
( i rented some land to expand, worked very hard for little reward)
I advised him to invest in something to build up some equity.
He is well placed to hear about oportunities
 

unlacedgecko

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Fife
Moving is not for everyone, i worked as a sheperd for a very succsesfull farmer and he moved quite a bit before he finaly setteld down.
He told me that he never feels as if he belongs anywere, and the children said they hated moving quite often. Son told me he can make friends quite easily but does not have real mates.

I left home at 18, nearly 20yrs ago. Since then (apart from 4yrs when my son was born) I've never lived anywhere longer than 18months.

I can identify with a lot of that.
 

ImLost

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Not sure
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.
Thanks @CopperBeech i did see this, but haven't digested it yet as some virus smashed me round the head with a baseball bat and I've hardly touched my phone/read anything. Will reply to it ASAP.
 

ImLost

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Not sure
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' 😁
I might just take you up on that 😜

Putting up with one old git doesn't bother me, I spend most days with a head full of demons telling me I'm doing it wrong!
 
If one social media follower in a 100 buys an 1/8 beef box once a year, it makes sense to build a big following
If one social media follower in a 100 buys an 1/8 beef box once a year, it makes sense to build a big following
If one social media follower in a 100 buys an 1/8 beef box once a year, it makes sense to build a big following
Only if you have beef boxes to sell.

Let’s face it, as has been said earlier in this thread, half of these social media heros aren’t farming, aren’t producing anything at all other than ‘content’. They effectively lose money on livestock in order to have the props to attempt to make money as an influencer / ambassador.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 79 42.5%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 65 34.9%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 16.1%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 6 3.2%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

  • 1,287
  • 1
As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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