Farmer 's Union of Wales Conference

The Farmer's Union of Wales (www.fuw.org.uk)(Twitter @FUW_UAC) held a one-day conference this week at the Royal Welsh Showground at Llanelwedd near Builth Wells in mid-Wales, the subject of which was Opportunities for Growth post-Brexit. The Farmer & I thought it would be interesting to attend, so having gained permission from the Sons to go and spend a night away, we made our way up to Builth very early on Thursday morning through the glorious autumnal hills of mid-Wales. The conference was well attended by farmers, representatives of associated agricultural businesses & very pleasingly, a group of students from Llysfasi agricultural college in north Wales (disappointing that other Welsh agricultural colleges had not sent a delegation of students). There were a number of familiar faces and old acquaintances.
The speakers for the day covered many different aspects of the current agricultural industry from the history & importance of agricultural shows, the remote monitoring of the landscape by satellite, drone and radar for 'data-driven agriculture' and environmental monitoring, the economic history of UK and EU pre- and post-Brexit and the challenges facing Welsh agriculture in the post-Brexit scenario amongst others. The general tone was one of positivity and optimism that Wales can make Brexit work and that Welsh agriculture has a real place in the brave new world of post-Brexit Britain, not that it will be easy but the challenges are there to be overcome.
Gleaned from the day's talks, some (very) random points...make of them what you will;
Average farm income £24,700, for hill farmers £14,700
90% of Welsh lamb exports go to EU
Norway imposes a tariff of 425% on imports
Satellites the size of a bread bin take images of Wales every day
Welsh lamb & beef are internationally recognised brands
The first Agricultural Society was formed in 1755 in Brecknockshire(Breconshire)
9% of the population of Wales works in agriculture
There are 20-23,000 migrant workers in agriculture in UK
The EU has the highest agricultural tariffs 90%,compared with USA 10%
5% of lamb & beef production in Wales is consumed in Wales, 60% in England
There are no free trade agreements with Europe,free trade agreements are mostly with former French colonies including Syria & Lebanon

After a long and stimulating day we headed off to find the B&B I had booked us into for the night, which was only 3 miles from the RWAS showground. However, in our rush to leave in the morning I had forgotten to bring the directions, contact details and map of how to find the farm we were supposed to be staying on!! We do not have a mobile phone or sat-nav & signal would probably been non-existent anyway. All I knew was the name of the farm and that it was somewhere off the A483. Now, mid-Wales is a large area of hills, very winding roads, farms which have very similar names and it is very easy to get lost, which we did. Eventually up a narrow lane after many twists and turns and re-tracing our steps, we found someone who was able to give us directions, so a couple of miles later and following a farmer on a quad bike for a mile as he moved his sheep up the narrowest of lanes and then following a hedge-trimmer for another 1/2 mile up a similar lane we found our destination, Trecoed Farm (www.trecoedfarminbuilthwells.co.uk) and received the warmest welcome from Elsie, the landlady who promptly made us a much-needed cup of tea accompanied by large slices of fruit cake. Wonderful! We had a very comfortable night and headed off the following morning after a substantial cooked breakfast. Even one night away is a holiday and I would certainly recommend Trecoed Farm B&B to anyone visiting the Builth wells area.

Cider-making, October, Rowan Jelly

Its cider-making time again. The Farmer has been very busy over the last week or so processing vast quantities of apples from our own orchards and fruit given to us by friends & neighbours. The process is quite speedy with an apple scratter to crush the fruit which is then put in the press and the resulting golden juice is then put into the fermenting drums to sit in the kitchen for a few days until it has finished bubbling when it is then transferred into kegs to mature. Some of the juice is put into plastic bottles for freeezing as straight apple juice to see us through the winter or brought into the house for drinking straightaway. It is gorgeous. Last year's vintage of cider is proving to be very palatable and is a glorious clear honey-gold in colour. It is an amazing process...what starts out as very cloudy juice which oxidises almost immediately to a dark biscuit-y brown colour and is not all that appetising becomes this beautiful clear golden liquid, a transformation that is entirely natural with no additives or preservatives of any kind, just the naturally occurring yeasts working their magic.

October is already proving to be as busy as the rest of the year. The Sons have been out cutting silage again for neighbours as we are having such good weather at present, dry and still fairly warm in the sunshine but with quite strong winds now and then. A few days ago when we were still having showers of rain there were several amazing sightings of vast wide rainbows casting across the landscape, quite beautiful. The valley has been echoing with the rattle of hedge-trimmers out and about along roadsides and in fields. The hedges need to be c kept in check but I think the Farmer would agree with me that the trimming ought to be left until the winter so that the birds and small mammals can glean what food they can from the hedge-row berries of which there are still quite profusion. It is no longer worth me going out to pick blackberries but there are still lots of small fruits including the rose-hips & hawthorn berries to be had.
After a particularly windy night a week or so ago I found a goodly quantity of rowan berries had been blown off the high branches of the trees up one of the ancient lanes on the farm, so I gathered them up and made some beautiful rose-pink rowan jelly which is delicious served as an accompaniment to roast meat.

Autumn on the Farm.

This is one of the lovely comments left in our cottage visitors book this summer...remarks & drawings like this do make us feel that we are getting something right in what we offer our guests. (Click on photo to enlarge it to read the comments.) We have had a very busy season and although we are now officially into autumn we still have guests coming to stay. The countryside at this time of year is glorious, the trees and hedges are still green but with hints of tawny gold beginning to appear and the rich ruby ripeness of the hawthorn berries adding a depth of colour to the high hedges. We have been having such lovely weather this past few days that it puts a glow over everything. The swallows have now left us, just in the last couple of days, on their long flight back to the southern sun. We are now in the season of lighting fires in the evenings and ensuring that the log supply for next year is well advanced. A shed full of seasoning logs is a deeply satisfying sight.
Over on the coast there are reports of seal pups on several of the beaches. People are advised to stay off the beach itself and keep their dogs on leads but the pups can be viewed quite easily. They are a beautiful sight, the fat roly-poly pups in their thick creamy coats with their huge dark sad eyes. The mother seal is usually out in the water keeping a close eye on the pup and she is very wary of any intrusion.

On the farm things are busy with slurry-spreading and hedge-trimming. We are taking lambs and bull calves to the various markets each week at present. Calving is well underway and we have about thirty to feed each day with more due over the next weeks. The bull calves we sell on but the heifers are all kept to be reared as 'followers' to the dairy herd. We have always calved down at this time of year though many dairy herds tend to go for spring calving and some do all year round calving, but it suits us to have the calves all come at one period though it can get very labour intensive.

Local Show in the Rain

One of the best things about living in the country are the local agriculture shows which carry on regardless of the weather, which this year was unrelenting rain. Llandysul Show, was held yesterday despite the continual downpour. The Farmer was stewarding for the one of the cattle judges and was soaked to the skin but so was everyone else so they just all carried on cheerfully swathed in heavy duty waterproofs. The grandchildren and I were slightly better off placing our entries for the cookery & children's classes in the craft & horticultural marquee though the rain was coming down the poles and the wind was blowing hard enough to disturb the displays but we farming folk are a stoical lot and there was a lovely air of jolliness and determination that the show must go on.
The Farmer had also entered various item in the rural crafts section & between us all we did quite well as the photo shows, including the Farmer winning the Rural Crafts cup. So, well done the Robinsons!

I love small country shows. They show a side of country life that is often overlooked. It is not the tweeness of 'country living' as portrayed in the glossy (dare I say it, rather patronising) lifestyle magazines, it is the real life of people who work very hard and who, for pleasure, take great pride in growing the longest runner bean, or the heaviest marrow or making delightful flower arrangements in teacups. Shows like this have been running for decades and very little will have changed over the years. Old men show their beautiful hand carved walking sticks, old ladies bake cakes and grow sweetpeas for the show as they have done all their lives. Children are encouraged to enter the handwriting competitions and to make pictures using buttons, or weird animals out of vegetables and there are always plenty of entries. The handicrafts section is always a delight with exquisite knitting, embroidery and patchwork items on display and wood-turning and carving to a very high standard. This is all in addition to the cattle, sheep and horses that are so carefully groomed and trained for the show by hardworking farmers and their families who do the extra work because they love it and will ensure that they go to the shows almost no matter what.

Sheepdog Trials, Country Show

I recently had a yen to go to see some sheepdog trials, something we have not done for many years so after checking the International Sheepdog Society website, www.isds.org.uk I was pleased to find that trials are held almost every week somewhere in Wales, many of them within our locality. They are not widely advertised and are often part of a local village show as was the one we went to in a tiny place called Cwmsychpant. We took small grand-daughter with us and had a lovely time watching a number of dogs of varying ages and abilities being put through their paces. It was fascinating. The Farmer, who is a life member of the International Sheepdog Society & used to trial his wonderful dog Sam a long time ago, was able to explain about the run out and the course the dog has to manoeuvre the three or five sheep through to the ultimate goal of penning the sheep within the time given. The shepherd stands at start of the course and directs the dog around the course with whistles & shouts until the sheep are within range of the pen when they can be guided in and the gate shut on them...job done, as they say.
The Farmer has two sheep dogs here at the moment, eight year old Molly who is very good and useful and two year old Judy is very keen and sometimes useful, but still learning.
AS well as the sheepdog trialling there was the show which was great. It was very small but well attended by the locals and the entries in the craft tent were astounding. There was such enthusiasm for the event as shown by the number of entries in each class whether it be for runner beans, beautiful flower arrangements, photographs of country life, hand-writing, knitting, patchwork, exquisite embroidery, children's artwork, baking or jams, chutneys & wines.

There was a great display of vintage tractors & a collection of old tractor seats, which may sound bizarre but was actually rather beautiful.

We also met some acquaintances who were busy with their very small children and ponies, the Best Young Handler class where the youngest handlers were only 3yrs old and needed to be guided around the ring, all very sweet and very Thelwell!
It was very enjoyable way to spend a rare free Saturday (no cottage changeover as my current guests are in for a fortnight) and the show field was on the top of a hill with panoramic views across to the Brecon Beacons, stunning!

Strumble Head Lighthouse, Labrador Puppies

This past week we had one of the Farmer's old college friends & his wife come to stay for a couple of days and as always when we have house-guests we take them out for the day. This time we headed off down to Pembrokeshire and ended up at Strumble Head with its wonderful Edwardian lighthouse. The lighthouse was built in 1908 on the tiny island of Ynys Meical to give it its Welsh name, and is accessed by a short bridge that is now closed to the public, though the Farmer remembers going there as a child and being able to cross to the island itself and go up to the lighthouse. Nowadays it can only be viewed from a distance. The lighthouse is one of several along the Pembrokeshire coast marking this dangerous stretch of coastline between Ireland and Wales and is spectacular. We were there on a very windy day but despite odd flurries of drizzle it was fine and clear and the sea was being whipped up into 'white horses' and looked very dramatic with sprays of seafoam being flung up on the rocks and cliffs of the island.

Younger Son's lovely black labrador Jess produced 9 beautiful black puppies 10 days ago and they are doing very well. We had thought that as the father of the litter was yellow we might have had a multi-coloured litter as we have done in the past, but not this time, they are all satiny-black and very sweet. They do not photograph well at this stage and they just a black mass of twitching sleepers. Once their eyes open they become much more photogenic.

Summer Work & Picnics

These past few days of heat & sunshine have meant a time of frantic busy-ness for the Farmer & the Sons. They have all been putting in very long hours making silage for ourselves and others. Apart from the hours in the fields there have also been treks across the county to other farms taking the machinery, wagons, balers, rakes to do their contracting work. The wonderful weather of course, as always, means that everyone wants their grass cutting at the same time so no sooner is work completed on one farm than they have to make their way to the next farm even if it is 11.00pm, sometimes to carry on working into the small hours or just to leave the kit ready for next morning. It is an exhausting time of year, but also very satisfying when another heap of bales is stacked on a yard or a clamp sheeted up. The Farmer has commented that it was rather a wonderful sight very late last night, after dark to see the lights of three other tractors criss-crossing faraway fields, all like him, working to get the grass in...the unacknowledged late night workers who so often are criticised for disturbing the peace of the countryside and holding up traffic, just doing their job of feeding the nation. Farmers cannot work 9-5 when so much of what we do is weather dependent & when hundreds of acres of grass need to be harvested.
I spend much time making piles of sandwiches which are grabbed by tractor drivers as they come & go between jobs. On Sunday however, I had a phone call to say would I take a cooked lunch, in the form of lasagne & boiled potatoes, out to the field where they were working. The original plan had been that they would come home for lunch but as usual the plan changed. The lasagne was just out of the oven so it was packed into a large basket along with the spuds, cake and ginger beer. The Grandchildren & all the dogs piled into the jeep & I drove across the valley to serve lunch to the hungry menfolk. So, how do you stop two 150 horse-powered tractors in their tracks? Unpack food & drink onto the bonnet of the 4x4!!

Th recent spell of very hot weather is glorious but I am always very grateful that I live in a stone-built, thick-walled, north-facing farmhouse into which I retreat when the temperatures soar. The poor dogs have been suffering, especially the very pregnant black labrador. She has found the excessive heat very trying and so trips to the pond for swimming sessions have been very popular. The puppies are due in the next few days and it will be fun to have summer puppies again.

Wool Collection Day, Rose Petal Jam, Bees

Today was wool collection day. We took our wool sacks into our local town where the lorry from the Wool Producers of Wales (www.britishwool.org.uk) depot at Brecon was waiting. We had to be there at 9.15am and we joined a short queue to unload our sacks and watch them being loaded onto the lorry. The Farmer had shorn our modest flock of about 50 ewes last month and the fleeces had been packed into the wool sacks to wait for collection day.
Some wool-ly facts;
Out of a world population of 1,148,300 sheep the UK has 33,989 sheep.
The UK produces 21,672 tonnes of clean raw wool.
The UK has more native breeds within its shores than any other country.

The organisation Campaign for Wool (www.campaignforwool.org)has influenced an new international demand for wool and thereby has achieved a three-fold price increase for farmers for the wool they produce. At one time, not that many years ago, it was costing more to shear the sheep than we were getting for the fleeces. In fact the price was so bad we did not bother sending our wool but kept it for several years and used it for insulation in building projects.

Note at the bottom of the letter we received giving us our collection time;

'Category 3 Animal By-product Not For Human Consumption Sheep's Wool'...just so we know!

The roses have been superb this year and I was inspired to have a go at making rose-petal jam so collected 200grammes of petals from the garden. They smelt just heavenly during the process of jamification. After gently crushing the petals with some sugar and lemon juice the resulting 'paste' was added to a pan of boiling sugar and water and boiled until it set. I then strained the petals out to get a beautiful rosy-glowing jam. It is delicious on fresh scones & even better drizzled over vanilla ice-cream!

200gm rose petals
600gm sugar
600ml water
Juice of 1 lemon

We have just discovered a swarm of bees has taken up residence in the eaves of our farmhouse. Its not problem, just a bit noisy in the kitchen (though the bees are not in the kitchen but in the roof-space of the room above) and the bats aren't too happy but I'm sure they'll all sort themselves out. The Farmer, an experienced bee-keeper, says there's nothing he can do as the bees are inaccessible and so we'll just have to wait for them to move on. He will probably put a collecting box near the house and hope they will decide it is a better place to live.