What's new at Sunnyside Farm
A year in review
I cant actually remember what the weather did at the start of the year, but I know we had a good spring. The grass grew well and saved me from buying too much silage.
The cows all calved well and gave us about 30 beatiful calves, mainly dexters and a few angus. Hyacinth (the black and white pet cow) gave us yet another beauty of a calf. It was big and needed to be delivered by me and David. It was pretty much davids 1st job on the farm and a baptism of fire. That was good practise as we had to help “little red “ with her calf in the middle of a field in a thunder storm. We had to take cover in the pickup whilst the lightening passed. Miss red and her calf we fine.
Lambing was very successful. All ewes lambed with only 1 loss. A sunnyside record was reached with 39 lambs born in 1 day.
Our neighbours who supply our dairy bulls gave up milking and sold the Knockenjig herd, a very sad end.
Then came summer, open farm Sunday was a great success and we will be doing it again at the beginning of june. We had about 70 people up and with the bbq and farm walk I think a good time was had by all. Thanks to everyone who helped and came.
July and august were wet beyond belief. The summer was only saved by a glorious September which saw the veal calves stay outside a good month longer than they ever have.
As autumn drew in we started to finish more dexters. We will be using about 1 a month this next year, we hope to be up to 2 a month by next Christmas. We bought all new tups. Fraser, a Shetland. A Hampshire down and a coloured Ryeland. We will see what we get in the spring.
Half the dexter herd is housed at our neighbours, knockenjig. Their cow sheds are mainly empty now. David and Rosemary are enthusiastic dexter eaters and so realise the importance of there job! The other half are out wintered on our hill, along with the steers and of course Jeremy the Jersey.
Winter has set in and the routine seems endless as spring is certainly not on the horizon. Bird the Ayrshire is safe inside the shed with all his Ayrshire friends.
The pigs are doing ok in the cold but we don’t seem to have enough space this year so we will have to think of what to do. Archie the pet pig has moved into some new arks we have just bought and seems very content.
As I write this jan 1st we have had 4-5 inches of lying snow for nearly 2 weeks and it shows no sign of thawing.
See you somewhere.
dominic
The butchery courses are running along with our adopt a pig scheme, if you want any more info drop an email.
speak soon
Dominic
