The Farmers Mart Apr/May 2015 - Issue 39 | Page 66

Mount Pleasant Farm Where the wind of change is turning for one dairy farm Chris Berry meets ‘Winston’ and talks with Nigel Watson in North Frodingham. »»‘Winston’ looms high above Mount Pleasant Farm, North Frodingham in East Yorkshire where the Watson family has farmed since Nigel’s grandfather, Tom Milner Watson, bought it in 1957 having moved from Ulrome on the coast where he had farmed with his brother. Back then the farm at North Frodingham ran to 62 acres. Tom’s son and Nigel’s father Don, fresh from having studied at the new Bishop Burton College came with him. So who’s Winston? He’s the wind turbine that Nigel and wife Tina added recently and is gamely helping out since the milk price crashed, more of him later. Today, the farm runs to 185 acres owned with a further 70 acres rented. Nigel has 150 C H Farm Systems Proud to be associated with Nigel Watson of Mount Pleasant Farm Mob: [phone] | Office: 01751476117 | Email: [email protected] 66 Apr/May 2015 www.farmers-mart.co.uk Holstein Friesian cows in the adult herd with 70+ followers which run at a herd average of around 10,000 litres on what has been a fairly high input and high output system. They operate on 20-22 per cent herd replacement using AI from Cogent/Worldwide Sires. Milk is collected by ARLA every day and the parlour is presently a 16/16 herringbone. Plans are afoot to move into robotic milking later in the year. It is a plan that Nigel has been thinking about for a while and after considering whether it was even time to pull out of dairying altogether earlier this year, when prices hit another low he is ready to take the plunge with this and other measures. “Robotic milking will make the cows’ lives easier and the