A top price of 2,700gns was achieved and 12 lots sold for 2,000gns or more when the Goostrey herd of Holsteins and Aryshires was dispersed for Griffiths Farming, Cheshire.Variety is the spice of life for young Wales Woman Farmer of the Year
Barry Alston catches up with the latest Wales Woman Farmer of the Year award-winner, mid-way through lambing 1,800 ewes in a five-week stint.
As with any farmer's wife and mother of three young children - aged six, four and 18 months - Lynda Perkins leads a pretty hectic life.
But that only scratches the surface of her day-to-day multi-tasking activities, all of which makes it fairly easy to see why she is the winner of the latest NFU Cymru-NatWest Wales Woman Farmer of the Year Award.
Barely out of her twenties, she also ranks as the youngest ever recipient of the accolade, which recognises the crucial role women play in making the farm a successful economic unit, as well as their involvement in local community life.
While looking after husband Neil - they met as agricultural degree students at Aberystwyth University - and youngsters Osian, Chloe and Sion ranks as the number one priority, 6am starts and late night finishes have become the norm for the Pembrokeshire born and bred "super mum."
"There is always something to do, whether it be in the house, on the farm or away from home," says Lynda, whose business incorporates a popular farm tourism camping, caravanning and self-catering diversification venture, developing a ready meals catering service and providing childminding facilities.
But it does not end there. She is also the secretary of the Dyfed Suffolk Sheep Breeders Association, the Pembrokeshire Royal Welsh ladies committee and the Pembrokeshire RABI ladies committee. Founded last May, it has already raised well over £10,000 for the farming charity.
All her roles though, are easily surpassed by a considerable management input into the running of what is the 269 hectare (640 acre) National Trust-owned Dinas Island Farm, at Pwllgwaelod, near Newport, lying within Pembrokeshire's coastal national park with around 40 hectares (100 acres) of cliff-top grazings.
Restructuring
There may well have been Perkins' farming there for more than 70 years, but these days it is far from a typical family farm - being mid-way through a total policy rethink, sparked by a passion for Suffolk sheep and fact-finding visits to New Zealand.
"I was 16 when I was introduced to the Suffolk breed through YFC stockjudging," says Lynda. "Being only one of a handful of girls entering the competition, I was determined to do as well as the boys and proved myself by going on to represent Pembrokeshire at the Royal Welsh Winter Fair.
"From that point I wanted to start my own Suffolk flock, but it was not until I had finished my agriculture and business studies degree that I had the opportunity.
"In August 2001, during the foot-and-mouth crisis, I bought my first five yearlings and five ewe lambs from the Arberth flock.
"The yearlings were put to the ram straight away and scanned at 200 per cent.
"From there, the flock grew quickly and I purchased five more yearling ewes at the Guildendown dispersal sale, five from the Crocco flock and 20 from Argoed, while using rams from Roses, Flooden, Howeburn and Drinkstone.
"Neil, like his father Roger before him, was then fortunate to secure a scholarship visit to New Zealand and came back convinced we would have to adapt our business in the light of the changes taking place with subsidies," she says.
One of the key factors was the cost of production, highlighted by the fact that, while New Zealand shepherds knew exa-ctly how many kilograms of meat per acre they were producing and what it was costing them, the majority of UK sheep farmers barely had a clue.
As a result, this spring marks year three of a far-reaching five-year restructuring programme, involving a 66 per cent increase in ewe numbers, a change of breed, self-sufficiency in feed requirements, outdoor lambing, full-scale performance recording and the introduction of high genetic merit rams.
The aim is to cut costs, improve performance and produce a far better end product by adopting a close-knit 'easy care' management approach.
Key to the success has been the move from the traditional breeding and selection of stock by eye (and merely guessing and hoping they would do well) to one of using performance-recorded traits. This method is based around stock that was hardy, productive and capable of lambing and rearing with as little assistance as possible.
"The status of my flock changed from a hobby flock to a working farm enterprise in its own right and had to support itself economically," says Lynda.
"It meant I had to stop bulk concentrate feeding and look towards genetics for the survival of my flock."
It also meant dropping 81 hectares (200 acres) of arable cropping, the rearing of up to 120 bull beef cattle a year and pushing sheep numbers up from 1,200 ewes to 1,800.
The ultimate ambition was to base the entire sheep enterprise around pedigree Suffolk and Lleyn flocks Ð with the Suffolks producing the rams for use on what will predominantly be a commercial flock of pure Lleyn ewes.
Nucleus flock
In order to get the ball rolling, more than 300 pure and pedigree performance recorded Lleyn ewe lambs and yearlings were purchased as the basis for the nucleus flock.
"We also started performance recording, backfat scanning and introduced the MioMax gene and AI," says Lynda.
"We purchased two high index Scottish rams from the Drinkstone flock and used Orton Supersire 05 by AI.
"The following year in 2007 we again used a high index tup AI on some ewes, with semen from a New Zealand ram who had the MioMax gene and we also bought a New Zealand Suffolk ram lamb, an ET from Robyn Hulme's flock at Ellesmere.
"Not being totally convinced by his unique slenderness at the front compared with my traditional rams, I put my trust in genetics, closed my eyes and hoped for the best as we went for outdoor lambing on our north Pembrokeshire headland in the pouring rain last April."
For this year's lamb crop, their New Zealand Suffolk ram has been put across the entire 70-head pedigree Dinasisland Suffolk flock, with a home bred MioMax tup waiting in the wings to go into action next year on the daughters of the New Zealand Suffolk.
"The aim is to breed a Suffolk with good mothering ability, vigour and hardiness, and a reduced heavy bone structure compared to that of the tradtional Suffolk, in order to reduce any lambing difficulties and the MioMax gene to increase carcase conformation to suit market requirements," she says.:
"Our selection procedure is harsh with any animals not meeting our standards going into the commercial flock or to the abattoir."
Electronic identification by means of handheld readers, boluses and tags has proved to be beneficial as a management tool, as has recording the grading returns of slaughter stock.
The introduction of New Zealand blood into the pedigree Suffolks has certainly made them more hardy and easy care, as well as cutting costs.
Perhaps by far the biggest change from the entire policy change, has been to lamb all 1,800 ewes outdoors Ð and all within a five week window from March 14.
Lower mortality
Experience so far over both good and bad lambing weather conditions is that the level of mortality has been far lower than if the ewes had been housed.
Mid-way through the current run there had even been 150 sets of triplets.
It certainly has reduced shepherding stress and labour input requirements, freeing up valuable time to even take on a
major contract heifer-rearing venture for one of the county's large-scale dairy herds, taking calves in from seven days old through to bulling.
When all the children are in school, there will hopefully also be more time for Lynda to further develop her other activities.
In all, there are five open-all-year-round self-catering, five-star rated luxury cottages, as well as the on-farm camping and caravanning facilities.
The specialist catering service offers a wide range of ready-to-eat meals all using meat produced on the farm, alongside farmhouse baked bread and cakes.
Longer-term, there are plans to extend the service to other tourism sites.
Her role as a registered childminder started after the birth of her second child and is something she finds 'very satisfying'.
"The children love being on the farm with the animals, exploring nature and with the space to run and learn," she says.
A recently completed course and formal qualification now enables her to host school visits to the farm and teach children about agriculture.
As to becoming Wales Woman Farmer of the Year, she says she was very flattered to find that a neighbour had nominated her.
"I do not think I do anything different from a lot of people Ð but it was fantastic to know that what I do has been recognised."
- Last month Neil Perkins also narrowly missed being chosen as Hybu Cig CymruÕs ÒFace of Welsh LambÓ farmer marketing ambassador.
Source:
Youngstock
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