Our Cows
We are a small non intensive dairy farm. Our priorities of cow health and milk quality are paramount rather than chasing litres produced. Our aim of top-quality milk that is high in butterfat and protein as historically our milk went to make Tickler Cheese, one of the best Cheddars in the UK and now our milk goes to Morrison’s to be sold as Farmer’s Milk.
Local Breeds & High Health Status
Our beautiful calm dairy cows are all crossbreeds using local breeds such as Jersey for efficiency and milk quality, Frisian for longevity and robustness, Scandinavian Reds which is itself a cross breed containing British Ayrshire and Shorthorns for their high health traits and still some older Holstiens.
We have a high Herd Health status and our cows are stress free which allows us to use very little in the way of medicines and vaccines. This has been achieved by using many of the permaculture and regenerative practices
Will and Tan have learnt over the last 25 years from discussion groups, farm walks and attending various Regenerative Farming courses at the Apricot Centre.
We aim to graze the girls 365 days per year with additional conserved forage in the form of silage or hay when the weather conditions or pasture growth is not favorable or we need to protect our soils.
With only 33 inches of rain a year the truly wet days are few and far between and the girls are usually happiest outside.
Grazing System
We employ a New Zealand paddock grazing system which segments each field into smaller areas, allowing the girls to be moved to fresh pasture regularly ensuring an efficient use of the acrea we have for grazing.
The cows have access to the hedges that surround the fields which they use as a free use medicine cabinet. This allows them to support their diet, they take in a greater number of species of plants, all with different vitamin and mineral spectrums and also medicinal plants – some of which contain high tannins levels which are a natural anthelminthics which helps reduce parasitic worms and this greatly reduces the need for us to use chemical wormers.
Our mild climate enables our naturally hardy cattle to graze outside almost all year without poaching the fields as soil health and soil protection are foremost in deciding which pastures to graze next.
Due to our non-intensive system – we aim for milk quality not milk quantity – our cows are long lived and once they have retired they move to graze fully for at least 6-12 months before being offered as our Retired Dairy Beef to our meat box customers and restaurants such as Salumi, Zephyr Burgers, Nora’s and to City College Plymouth Catering & Hospitality students for the PL1 restaurant.