The Farmers Mart Aug-Sep 2019 - Issue 64 | Page 50

50 MANOR FARM AUG/SEP 2019 • farmers-mart.co.uk NOTHING’S FLAT AT THIXENDALE CHRIS Berry talks with Charles Brader at Manor Farm. Drinking wine with Charles Brader and his lovely wife Gilda in their summer house at Manor Farm while taking in the evening sun has to be one of the most pleasurable interviews I’ve ever undertaken. Thixendale is a fabulous village and dale in the Yorkshire Wolds and is where Charles’ parents Ralph and Mary came to in 1953 when they married, Ralph having previ- ously ventured north from Lincolnshire to take on Squirrel Hall on the Sledmere Estate in 1947. Mary came from farming stock too, being a Burdass, one of the Thwing and Dotterel Burdasses. Charles is relaxed about the current state of affairs politically, although doesn’t take anything for granted. ‘We’ve been fortunate enough to have invested in fantastic farm machinery,’ says Charles. ‘And we’ve always tightened our belts, so if we come to a difficult period when Brexit occurs we should be able to sit things out a little until everything settles.’ ‘We were able to buy the farm in the early noughties. When my parents first came here the farm was 640 acres, a square mile, but it has been added to over the years and now runs to around 800 acres with a bit of land rented from Garrowby Estate. It is split to 300 acres of grassland and 500 acres of arable.’ In a land of huge sloping hills and vales to farm this amount under arable cropping is pretty amazing, but this doesn’t mean Charles has a sudden splurge of even terrain. ‘We don’t have any flat land at all, but the land that is here is good for wheat, barley, potatoes, peas and fodder beet. We’ve just given up with oilseed rape. Our main crops are 160-170 acres of winter wheat growing Grafton and Craft winter malting barley across 150 acres. This year we’ve also grown 30 acres of potatoes, 60 acres of rape, 50 acres of peas that we’ve just started growing for The Green Pea company and 15 acres of fodder beet for the sheep, which is also useful game cover.’ The main livestock enterprise is sheep with 700 breeding ewes of which 120 are Swaledales breeding Mules and in turn white-faced breeding ewes keeping all replacements. ‘We have Texel and Suffolk X. The Suffolks tend to get fitter a little quicker, but we’ve had some better quality Texels this year. We end up with around 1100 lambs each year and the bulk of our stock goes to Malton and York. Ours are fairly big sheep when they go at between 57-62 kilos, usually sold the following March. I’ve always believed the saying ‘you can only sell them once’ and I sell at market because we get paid on the day.’ ‘Our buyers aren’t supermarkets, they are the likes of Jewitts in Spennymoor and Alec Traves in Escrick. We lamb from April 7-8 and aim to get it done inside 25 days. I buy in 25-35 Swaledale shearlings each year from Middleton in Teesdale or Kirkby Stephen and I’m always looking to improve, so we buy the best we can afford. Years ago my dad would buy three-croppers thinking he was saving money but then they would only last two years. Buying shearlings means we get the quality and the length of term with our able to go for four or five crops.’ There is another form of livestock at Manor Farm of which Charles is mildly disparaging, but in a humorous context. He has a herd of around 20 Highland cattle. ‘They’re the worst investment you could ever make! But if I had a quid from every photograph taken of them from walkers it might be a different story. They are here to eat the poor grass and we ‘borrowed’ them 15 years ago from Robin Mackley on the Moors. I thought about having Luing cattle, but they don’t tend to like people and since we have the Wolds Way through here it makes sense to have something eye-catch- ing at least.’ Charles studied at Bishop Burton College and has developed the farm considerably in his lifetime with electric fencing around the whole farm, as he couldn’t afford post and rail throughout. His son-in-law Tom Lund makes the gates on the farm from his joinery business. Charles has also devel- oped woodland at Manor Farm. ‘Trees were put in from 1996. Up until then this farm hadn’t a wood on it. We also let a bit of shooting and have some shooting of our own.’ Horses have always played an impor- tant role in Brader life and it was equine involvement that brought Charles and Gilda together. ‘Gilda and I were married in 1981. I’d met her through hunting when she came up here from Shropshire in 1978. Gilda had been with the South Shropshire Hunt and the hunt’s master was asked to be master at the Middleton Hunt. He asked Gilda whether she would come and run the yard.’ ‘There are some who thought I was being chivalrous when I dismounted in order to pick up Gilda’s glove which she’s dropped, but in reality my horse was playing up. Either way it turned out to be the right move as we married and had two wonderful twin daugh- ters Charlotte who is now head of Go Racing in Yorkshire and Emma who is secretary to politician Godfrey Bloom.’ R.D. Marsden Haulage Ltd. Abattoir & Meat Wholesalers We supply high quality beef, pork and lamb through an efficient distribution service where standards are second to none. Selling a range of fresh meats prepared in modern hygienic premises to customer requirements. An independent family business providing haulage of grain and animal feeds throughout North Yorkshire Call us on 01904 728 246 www.atravesandson.co.uk All at R.D. Marsden Haulage Ltd. wish Charles Brader & Family of Manor Farm, Thixendale con�nued success Abattoir & Meat Wholesalers, 95 Main Street, Escrick, York, YO19 6TP T: 07789988094 | E: [email protected] Stoneyridge, Grewelthorpe, Ripon, North Yorkshire, HG4 3DS