Bog Myrtle & Peat

Having done the sums and agonised over the calendar, I am really beginning to channel my enthusiasm for new calves. These will be my first, so I am operating at a fever pitch of anxiety and excitement. Longer-term readers will remember the saga of my bulls last summer. I started with old Charlie, but injury… Continue reading

I seem to have developed a golden touch when it comes to owl boxes. My first few were failures way back in 2011, but recent progress has been extremely satisfactory. I can’t resist publishing a quick picture of “our” owls emerging from the latest box which hangs in the bull’s shed. I built this box… Continue reading

The cold weather has held everything back, and April is slipping away as if it were March. It has hardly been worth looking for any signs of black grouse yet, and the curlews are oddly subdued by the cold winds which run over the hills from the North and East. Stretching our legs last night,… Continue reading

The kestrels are settled and well. It has been almost a month since they began to pair off in the pine tree above the pig sty, and the little birds call throughout the day. The male brings prey for his partner, and she scrambles out of the nest to gobble down his gifts. Long periods… Continue reading

One of the things I enjoy about agriculture is the sheer slowness of it all. Decisions are made months ahead of time, and the business is steered over many weeks like an oil tanker. I can draw up strategies which dictate my activities for the whole year, and then these grand schemes can be broken… Continue reading

By a combination of chance and design, I’ve met a few Working for Grouse readers over the past few days. This has been great fun, although it’s always slightly bizarre to slip into instant familiarity with total strangers… Of all the many pleasures this blog brings me, the greatest is meeting and connecting with people… Continue reading

Despite having dithered and rung my hands over hedgerow management in previous blogs, I took the plunge and cut my first section of new hedge last January. It seemed counterintuitive to cut down all the plants I had grown, and I wrote in detail about the work (and my reservations) here. A little over a… Continue reading

I can hardly write about the soil without a quick mention of the cattle, which continue to thrive in the bitter cold. The hardy, hairy beasts have hardly blinked at wild winds and stinging ice. They are now eating a big bale of silage every five days, and there is a glowing pleasure to see… Continue reading

Having ploughed our best field in February, the time came to test the soil and find out what the next steps would be. As predicted, the results from the laboratory have just come back to show that the ground is pretty sour and poor. pH readings are around 5.5, and turnips require significantly less acidic… Continue reading

There is no steady progress towards spring. Change comes and goes like a tide, moving us forward and then back again in a lapping cycle. It feels like we are getting somewhere on mornings before the sun has risen and curlews fly whooping in slow loops around the hay fields. Here are the first shades… Continue reading