Udder trouble

A spot of udder trouble for Brookfield Ginny, a pedigree Longhorn cow with an Aberdeen Angus cross calf born this week.

One of her 'quarters' from her udder was seriously swollen with milk and too large for the calf to suck. It is the front left teat and out of camera view.
The only cure is to walk her in and for Jon to milk her out by hand to relieve the pressure of the milk and prevent mastitis. Soon the calf will be big and strong enough to suck on all four teats.





























Back to the field after a job well done.

Note the spots of white on the tail and belly of this black Aberdeen Angus cross calf.

The first Angus calves born this week

The first two Aberdeen Angus cross Longhorn calves were born this week.

Pictures will follow.

We are still very busy lambing and calving, and there is a lot to do in-putting all the lambing records and individual ear tag numbers into the computer.

On the arable side of the business a legume mix has been planted for arable silage under the Stewardship options, and the wild bird seed mix will be sown next and lastly the game cover will be the final spring sown crop.

the new arrivals

First lambs. A Wiltshire Horn triplet born yesterday. One will be taken off today and fostered onto a single ewe.












The first Longhorn calf this year in Kings Walden park. The picture was taken when he was a few hours old, and before the regulation ear tags were inserted.

Jon checking some of the Longhorn cows in their winter quarters.

Last night's edition of Countryfile made us all unbearably sad as the programmed highlighted the tenth anniversary of the devastating foot and mouth epidemic of 2001.

I lived through the trauma at very close quarters in my previous farming life in Northumberland and documented the epidemic in a diary for a national newspaper as Sarah Walton.

It was therefore incredibly painful to be reminded of the heinous waste of healthy animals and the total mismanagement of the tragic epidemic. We should also never forget the terrible fallout on people and businesses, both in the rural and tourist sector. Even this morning I still feel out of sorts, I think in all honesty I'd prefer not to be reminded.

The best website for all information about foot and mouth disease and other animal diseases such as bluetongue and bovine TB is run voluntarily by Mary Critchley at www.warmwell.com .

I recommend you visit Warmwell and we await next week's Countryfile programme where they aim to discuss how any future outbreaks may be dealt with. It should be interesting. Let's hope they have the right ideas this time, based on science, and that in our lifetimes we never see the like of it again.

Time to wean the calves

Today is the day we weaned the spring born calves from their mothers. This job has been slightly delayed this year on account of the run of treacherous ice that gripped the farm for the last 2 weeks.

The dozen oldest calves from the Offley Hoo based herd have been vaccinated against respiratory disease (IBR - a type of pneumonia) and will be housed until the spring. The herd based at Kings Walden will be weaned another day. The reason we vaccinate them is that in the first year the Longhorn herd became really quite ill on housing and lost condition. Once we started annual vaccination, after consultation with our vets, the health of the herd, especially the young stock, improved hugely. It is rather like us having an annual flu jab.

The youngest calves will remain on their mothers and be housed right through the winter.

New bull

Soon we will be getting a new bull.
An Aberdeen Angus bull from Glympton to put on the heifers [young cows to calve for the first time] and some of the other Longhorns.

The best Longhorn cows will still be pedigree bred for replacements for the herd.

This picture is of some of 14 bulls we went to look at. The bull at the centre of the photograph is not the one we are buying.

Glympton Express will be arriving shortly, he is 15 months old and will just have a small batch of young cows and heifers this year. He will not be fully grown until he is about 3 1/2 years old.