Springtime at Cannon Hall Farm by The Nicholson Family

Author:The Nicholson Family [Family, The Nicholson]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473599604
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2022-04-07T05:00:00+00:00

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In spring, farming is very much focused on the hundreds of ewes giving birth at Cannon Hall Farm, but in March 2020 one particularly handsome ram got his 15 minutes of fame on Springtime on the Farm. Grizzly Bear, the beautiful Swiss Valais Blacknose ram was bought from a breeder in the Scottish Highlands for the princely sum of £2,000. He was the perfect example of his breed, with a lovely thick coat of wool, four black booties, black knees and strong curled horns.

He certainly looked a winning specimen and could have been a contender at the Great Yorkshire Show if he’d ever had the chance, but his hopes of winning prizes were nipped in the bud when he was less than two years old. His magnificent curly horns began painfully pressing into the side of his face and the raw skin there became infected. “I spotted the problem as I was shearing him,” says David. “It’s a smell that you don’t forget and I could see that it could turn into a big problem if we didn’t act quickly. The last thing you want to happen is for the smell to attract flies that lay their eggs there for maggots to develop.”

There was nothing for it but to call in the vet. In a spring episode of This Week on the Farm, viewers watched Matt the vet cut through Bear’s mighty horns using just a cheese wire and a whole lot of Yorkshire muscle. Although it certainly looked dramatic, it was a painless for Bear, although he did look a bit confused – some may say sheepish – by the end of it.

“When we’ve had to remove a ram’s horns, it’s a welfare issue and done for the good of the animal,” says David. “It means that we’ll never be able to exhibit him as an example of his breed, but his strong pedigree is in his genes, so we’re hoping he will father many more Swiss Valais lambs in the future. He’s fathered loads of great lambs already, including Brussel and Sprout, and the quality of the markings on our Swiss Valais lambs has improved no end. We love the breed so much that we’re looking to go back and buy another ram from the breeder in Scotland so that we have two bloodlines on the farm. That way we can sell unrelated pairs of males and females on to other people. Swiss Valais sheep are always bred as pedigrees and are far too valuable to be in the food chain, so they will always be sold on as pets, or to other breeders.”

Talking of future generations, every breeding male on the farm needs to have his faculties checked before he is put to work with the females. In spring 2021, it was time to see how Ted, the young Highland bull, was likely to perform when breeding time came around. After guiding the 20-month-old into the cattle crush, the width of his testicles was measured and his sperm was quality tested to ensure he could deliver the goods.

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