The Farmers Mart Jun/Jul 2015 - Issue 40 | Page 35

Richard & Chris Frankland

“My family were working
elsewhere milking for others
and I thought we would be
better taking on something
that keeps everyone involved.
We didn’t want to lose Pam,
TJ and Jon but we didn’t have
enough to keep them and
then this farm came up. They
were all mad keen on it so we
put in a tender for it and won!
We bought our new starter
herd of 110 cows from Graham
Bellerby near Harrogate and
with still having heifers from
our previous herd we now
have 180 pedigree Holstein
Friesians milking at Long Bank
with a current herd average
of 8,800 litres that we’re
aiming towards 10,000. We
are calving all year round and
using mostly sexed semen
and a Belgian Blue/British
Blue bull.
!We didn’t buy anything that
was above its third calf o our
replacements have been fairly
low so far. The dairy operation
at Long Bank also has more upto-date milking machinery than
we had at New Hall with a rapid
exit parlour. We are currently )