Leven Fields one of the main attributes of the Salers – easy calving. The pelvic opening can be twice as large as some other perhaps better-known breeds and that is making a huge difference. We’ ve found that the very unique set of traits the British cattle men and women need are encompassed in the Salers.’
‘ That includes dairy farmers. About a quarter to one-third of the bulls we sell are bought to go into dairy herds. In commercial suckler herds, farmers get sick of having to pull calves out, so to have cows that can pop calves out without assistance is not just easier, it’ s also less time consuming. We hardly ever see our cows and heifers calve. We also weigh every calf and all of ours are in the mid-30 kgs range. I went out a 7am this morning and there was nothing happening. A short while later I went again and one had calved, while another calved in the time I’ d checked on the first one. They fly out of them.’
Terence was raised in the London suburb of Caterham near Croydon and came north due to his career with ICI. It was through his brother Malcolm that Terence found his love of cattle.
‘ Malcolm was interested in farming and had a small holding in Nottinghamshire where he had store beasts on 12 acres. Jane and I would go down and look after the place and the cattle when he and his wife Gillian went on holiday.’
‘ We then had the idea of setting up in business together and we did just that between Jane, myself, Malcolm and Gillian. Both couples sold our respective homes and bought 90 acres here at Leven Fields plus the farm buildings in 1991. We couldn’ t afford the farmhouse in the village. Over the years we built up the concern while Malcolm and I had our regular day jobs. Jane and Gill looked after the farm with Jim Ridley. Jim’ s a real proper Yorkshire character and had worked for the farmer who had this place before us.’
‘ We were fortunate that some land came up adjacent that took the acreage to the 208 it is today. It’ s all down to grass except around 30 acres of woodland and we have a mile and a half of river frontage on the River Leven. We acquired arable land in addition, but sold it when Malcolm and Gillian left the partnership and moved to Scotland where Malcolm had set up an agri business.’
Terence and Jane had always been more cattle people than arable farmers.
‘ Our interest is now wholly cattle. We started with Salers in November 1990 through a crossbred cow and embryo, plus a heifer. We’ ve built the herd up from there. We currently have 55 cows of which three are Charolais with the rest Salers. Bulls are sold at between 20 months to 3 years old and heifers at around 15-18 months. We get the heifers in-calf to our Salers bulls and then sell them as we want the farmer to be able to see what we mean about easy calving. With more than half our customers buying Salers for the first time we want everything to be right.’
Commercial herds are where much of Terence and Jane’ s production is bound.
‘ Our pedigree market is tiny in comparison to the commercial beef sector. If we sell to a pedigree buyer that’ s nice but it’ s not our goal. Suckler herds and dairy farmers are our main areas direct from the farm. We also enter cattle into the Salers Society sales throughout the UK. as well as several agricultural shows. It’ s important that the animals look their best so we find Showtime Supplies products invaluable’
Bishopton Vets Now OPEN in Northallerton
• Dedicated farm veterinary team
• Proactive herd health approach
• Competitively priced medicines and animal health products
• Access to a wide range of training courses
• Regular discussion group meetings
• In-house specialist advice available
Contact us: Email: farmdesk @ bishoptonvets. co. uk www. bishoptonvets. co. uk Tel: 01609 622009
Bishopton Vets are delighted to service Terence Pye from their new practice on Standard Way Business Park, Northallerton.
Committed to long term partnerships supporting British livestock farming.
www. farmers-mart. co. uk Summer 2017 57