The Farmers Mart Oct/Nov 2014 - Issue 36 | Page 32

SOUTHFIELD FARM

Where ducks and geese
roam freely (and the horse
has an unusual friend!)
Chris Berry visited the Mathison family
of Southfield Farm in Leven.
It’s getting to that time of
year at Southfield Farm
in Leven over in the East
Riding of Yorkshire.
Christmas is coming and the
geese are getting fat! This is
where the Mathison family has
built up its Yorkshire Ducks &
Geese enterprise, in addition
to their arable farm and grain
store, that now sees them
preparing some 2,000 geese
for the festive season - and
tens of thousands of ducks
throughout the year.

32

Oct/Nov 2014 FarmersMart

“It’s chaos here during
December and right up
until Christmas Eve,” admits
Stuart Mathison. “We’ve
certainly moved on a long
way from when we started
with geese 25 years ago. At
that time we bought a dozen
from a local farmer and tried
to fatten them. We didn’t do
very well and soon found
out that it was because we
hadn’t taken on the right
breed. The following year
we started with the Danish

breed, Legarth and we were
under way properly.”
The Mathisons collect the
day-old goslings, the Norfolk
strain of the Legarth, in two
batches of 1,000 and have
now become one of the
largest geese producers in
the whole of Yorkshire. This
year’s first batch was born
on 16 April, with the second
batch born in May. They
stock in batches for both
ease of management and to
attain the sizes they need

To read more, visit www.farmers-mart.co.uk