Farmer Focus: Grateful for advice to make time for family

The summer months have been full of activity. The wet conditions have resulted in good grass growth during the past six weeks, with plenty of small windows of opportunity to get some silage in.

Over the school holidays, having extra help on the farm ensured we could get the work done in a timely fashion.

This meant we could spend more time away from the farm as a family, creating memories (of which more in a moment). And every evening, we enjoyed watching the Paris Olympics.

See also: How two dairy farms achieved a better work-life balance

About the author

Dafydd Parry Jones

Dafydd Parry Jones and wife Glenys, Machynlleth, Powys, run a closed flock of 750 Texel and Aberfield cross ewes and 70 Hereford cross sucklers cows on 180ha. Their upland organic system uses Hereford bulls, Charollais terminal sires and red clover silage, multispecies leys and rotational grazing.

Read more articles by Dafydd Parry Jones

Barry, our friend and neighbour, has sadly passed away after three years of illness.

About 20 years ago, he decided that farming was no longer his desired occupation and wanted to pursue another line of business.

This gave us the opportunity to rent a parcel of his land that adjoined our farm, on an annual basis.

After a few years, we gave him an offer for the land. I have a great memory of our evening of negotiations in his living room.

There was one part of the discussion that had a profound effect on me.

He told me that before he would even consider selling us the land, I had to promise him I would not work too hard and dedicate enough time to my young family.

This was his voice of experience. He had worked all hours of the day on the farm during the early years of his family and felt that he had deprived them of the valuable family time.

He didn’t want this to happen to us. We did come to an agreement that evening and shook hands on a deal.

The parcel of land that we acquired has given us many pleasurable years of reseeding leys, planting new hedges and making other improvements, such as investing in new fencing and gates.

But, keeping that promise to my friend has brought the biggest pleasure of all, as I learnt early in my children’s life that it is so important to spend as much time as possible with them.

Time that you can never recover. And for that, I will be forever grateful to Barry.