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View From The Wellies - December 06

The Highland Perthshire Branch of the National Farmers Union of Scotland held its Annual General Meeting at the Riverside Inn, Grandtully on the 28 November.  President Jane Anderson and Vice-President Gordon Stewart were both re-elected for a further 1 year term. The branch held six committee meetings, and members attended various meetings in Perth to deal with issues affecting the agricultural industry as, and when, they occurred.

The after dinner speaker for the evening was Nigel Miller who is Chairman of the NFU Livestock Committee.  Nigel runs sheep and cattle on his farm near Stow in the Borders.  Although now a full time farmer, in a past life he was a vet.  As well as covering all the current issues such as animal transport regulations, sheep tagging and complying with all the other rules and regulations we face, he was also able to recount some very good stories about being a vet in the north of Scotland. 

One story in particular took us all back to the days when life seemed much simpler, before cattle required two tags and a passport each!  After visiting a farm and taking blood samples from the 5 pet cows tied in a traditional byre and all having their own names, but no ear tags of any kind, Nigel was faced with the problem of how to match the blood samples.  The unconcerned farmer took Nigel to the farmhouse for the traditional tea, scones and a ‘dram’.  After the hospitality part of the visit was over, the farmer then produced 5 matchboxes which were kept on the mantelpiece.  Each box had a cow’s name on the side and a tag inside!

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Feeding cattle outside hasn’t been much fun lately as the mud around the feed troughs and feed trailers seems to get deeper, as the rain does its best to make sure we get our average rainfall for the year, after lagging behind for so long. 

Some farmers are trying new methods of feeding cattle outside.  Fodder rape, kale or stubble turnips are sown during the summer and round bales of straw or silage are spaced out in a line along the field.  During the winter an electric fence is used to ‘strip graze’ the crop.  By moving the fence across the field every day or so the cattle get fresh food without having to take a tractor across wet fields, eliminating rutting and compaction caused by heavy tractors on water-logged ground. 

This method of feeding is best suited to lighter, free-draining soils as problems with soil erosion during heavy rainfall can occur as the above-mentioned crops don’t have much of a root structure left to hold soil in place after they have been grazed. 

Recent floods have also made it obvious that fields used for this type of over-wintering have to be chosen carefully, as most of the good flat fields in the bottom of the valley have been under water.

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Some good news for the Scottish livestock and haulage industries was announced in Parliament on the 23 November.  NFUS and other industry bodies had lobbied hard to secure important concessions on the proposed animal transport regulations.

  This means that vehicles making journeys of between 8 and 12 hours in the UK no longer have to install insulated roofs, maintain temperatures above zero degrees while loading, install forced ventilation, temperature monitoring and satellite navigation systems.  Discussions about making shallower ramp loading angles are still ongoing with the European Commission. The industry still faces costs of around £4m to provide all those who transport livestock over 65kms with certificates of competence.

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I hope you enjoy the festive season and whether you go for turkey or roast beef but spare a thought for us farmers, remember that your dinner started life on a farm somewhere, supermarkets are only the middlemen.