Farmer Focus: Training starts for world shearing record

In the middle of November we took the rams out. The big boys looked like they had worked hard and didn’t seem too worried about coming away from the ewes.

We are fortunate to have a friend further west in Cornwall on the south coast who has a dairy farm and is willing to let us graze lambs for the winter months.

It is a lot milder down there and not so exposed as we are here on the edge of Bodmin Moor.

We recently bought some store lambs; we shore them off with a winter comb and have put them away on grass keep.

Dusty, my five-week-old son, experienced his first of what will become many days in the shearing shed. The farm pram has to be one of the best investments; he sleeps like a dream in it… for the moment at least.

I also gave the store lambs the full works – a clostridial vaccine, a precautionary scab vaccine and a mineral drench. We also addressed any feet issues.

See also: NZ grading system could help avoid human error

Amid the drainage work we have been undertaking on the farm we have come across a lot of old tile drains that seem to have been blocked for some time, which leads me to believe the area was once drained and productive land.

In order to find the levels for our new drains to work, we have reinstated a pond that was once used as a holding dam. The water from this pond used to run via a leat [millstream] to a water wheel which powered the farm’s mill, so it’s been really nice to reinstate a bit of history.

With 2016 just around the corner, my team are now actively seeking sponsorship for the world nine-hour ewe shearing record, which I will undertake in July. I’ve started back at the gym – two mornings a week before the sun’s up – in order to get my body ready for the abuse it’s going to get.

We would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and prosperous New Year.

Read more from the livestock farmer focus writers 

Matt and Pip Smith run 1,085 breeding Romneys and Romney cross Lleyn ewes across 121ha. Matt is also a shearing contractor and trains sheep dogs.