Stocken Farm News - Revision history

Joan at 12:21, 29 October 2025

2025-10-29T12:21:42Z

Joan at 12:18, 29 October 2025

2025-10-29T12:18:01Z

Joan at 12:15, 29 October 2025

2025-10-29T12:15:08Z

Joan at 12:09, 29 October 2025

2025-10-29T12:09:25Z

Joan at 12:05, 29 October 2025

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Joan at 12:02, 29 October 2025

2025-10-29T12:02:11Z

Joan at 11:59, 29 October 2025

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Joan at 11:55, 29 October 2025

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Joan at 11:52, 29 October 2025

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Joan at 11:47, 29 October 2025

2025-10-29T11:47:40Z

@@ Line 179: / Line 179: @@
 [[File:On The Farm Feb 23 03.jpg|thumb]]
 [[File:On The Farm Feb 23 01.jpg|left|thumb|/]]
-'''Hallmark February 1923.'''  Report by Rchard West.
+'''Hallmark February 1923.'''  Report by Richard West.
 The daylight is getting longer which always helps after a cold or wet winter. It certainly has been wet over the last few months really making up for the drought we experienced in the summer. We still have some cattle out, which generally are not damaging the soil structure or grass leys despite the rain, the soil is far from capacity after the drought. The cattle that are out are beef rather than dairy cattle, they are Angus x Holstein and British Blue x Holstein that are about a year old. These breeds can take adverse weather quite well and probably prefer to be outside.
+[[File:On The Farm Feb 23 02.jpg|left|thumb]]
 The very cold weather we had in mid-December allowed us to clean the barns out, and to take the dung out to field heaps without damaging the fields as they were frozen solid. That is the best thing about the cold, the bad part is water pipes freeze and parts of the parlour freeze, so at 4 am when milking starts, any frozen parts must be identified and thawed out. The parlour holds 28 cows at a time, so the parlour does warm up quite quickly when the cows come in, exuding their heat.

@@ Line 178: / Line 178: @@
 On June 11th we will be opening the farm again for ‘'''Open Farm Sunday’.''' (See pictures of our last OFS in 2018). This is an open day where we open to the public to show what we do. Hopefully there will be trailer rides to fields, machinery to learn about, calves to meet and cows to see being milked. So hopefully we will see you here, fingers crossed, hoping for that long awaited sunny weather will still be here on the day!
 [[File:On The Farm Feb 23 03.jpg|thumb]]
 '''Hallmark February 1923.'''  Report by Rchard West.

@@ Line 177: / Line 177: @@
 On June 11th we will be opening the farm again for ‘'''Open Farm Sunday’.''' (See pictures of our last OFS in 2018). This is an open day where we open to the public to show what we do. Hopefully there will be trailer rides to fields, machinery to learn about, calves to meet and cows to see being milked. So hopefully we will see you here, fingers crossed, hoping for that long awaited sunny weather will still be here on the day!
+[[File:On The Farm Feb 23 03.jpg|thumb]]
 '''Hallmark February 1923.'''  Report by Rchard West.

@@ Line 352: / Line 352: @@
 Anyway, back to harvest preparations and all the machinery needs checking and servicing. This morning the combine coughed and spluttered and refused to start. Our main tractor, after getting over adblu problems last week (adblu the bane of a lot of modern machinery), brake lights have come on... so disc brakes need changing which means back wheels and axle off. All these issues 4 weeks after the 3-year warranty ran out!
-[[File:On The Farm May 21 01.jpg|alt=/|thumb]]
+[[File:On The Farm May 21 01.jpg|alt=/|thumb|Sieved chalk to get the Ph level correct]]
 '''Hallmark May 2021.'''  Report by Richard West.

@@ Line 352: / Line 352: @@
 Anyway, back to harvest preparations and all the machinery needs checking and servicing. This morning the combine coughed and spluttered and refused to start. Our main tractor, after getting over adblu problems last week (adblu the bane of a lot of modern machinery), brake lights have come on... so disc brakes need changing which means back wheels and axle off. All these issues 4 weeks after the 3-year warranty ran out!
+[[File:On The Farm May 21 01.jpg|alt=/|thumb]]
-'''Hallmark May 2021.'''  Report by Richard West
+'''Hallmark May 2021.'''  Report by Richard West.
 We have been busy in March and April with field work. The dry spell has allowed us to get a lot of slurry out, spread field dung heaps and work the ground to make a seed bed for the maize crop. For maize to germinate the soil temperature must be 10°C. In mid-April on a daily basis it has gone over 10°C and back to zero at 10cm depth, averaging about 7°C at 30cm depth. So I think we will aim to plant in the last week of April. We have given the wheat its main nitrogen application. Grass should be growing very rapidly at this moment but with the cold easterly wind and no rainfall in the last month it has been a terribly slow grass growth spring. Once our maize is planted, we will be praying for some warm rain.

@@ Line 392: / Line 392: @@
 Hallmark  February 2020
 [[File:On The Farm Nov 19 02.jpg|thumb]]
 '''Hallmark November 2019'''.  Report by Richard West

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+.
 [[File:On The Farm Nov 20 02.jpg|thumb]]
 '''Hallmark November 2020'''.  Report by Richard West.

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 We are also doing some management on some of our hedges, where elder is taking over. We are taking it out and replacing it with hawthorn and holly which makes a better stockproof hedge in due course.
-Farming is often affected by political decisions. The new agricultural bill is about to be reintroduced. This will be a significant piece of legislation that will have quite an effect on the direction of UK agriculture for the next few decades. Hot on its heels will be the new Environmental Bill which will no doubt also have implications for agriculture particularly in relation to soil, air and water quality. It feels like as we move into a new decade, we are moving into a new farming era, presumably we will leave Europe and go away from the Common Agricultural Policy. It is difficult to predict where we will be by the end of the decade. Hopefully still producing foods for people who like to consume them, but this may not the case, food maybe produced out of thin air and created in factories by then...
+Farming is often affected by political decisions. The new agricultural bill is about to be reintroduced. This will be a significant piece of legislation that will have quite an effect on the direction of UK agriculture for the next few decades. Hot on its heels will be the new Environmental Bill which will no doubt also have implications for agriculture particularly in relation to soil, air and water quality. It feels like as we move into a new decade, we are moving into a new farming era, presumably we will leave Europe and go away from the Common Agricultural Policy. It is difficult to predict where we will be by the end of the decade. Hopefully still producing foods for people who like to consume them, but this may not the case, food maybe produced out of thin air and created in factories by then..
 '''Hallmark August 2020.'''  Report by Richard West.
+Hallmark May 2020'''.'''  Report by Richard West
 '''Hallmark November 2019'''.  Report by Richard West
@@ Line 422: / Line 412: @@
 With all the negative press farming receives we have been tagged in some positive tweets recently which really brightens your day up. Also last week whilst our Landrover was parked in Princes Risborough it had two notes attached to it, the first handwritten one read: THANK YOU FOR BEING A FARMER, the other note was of monetary value. This was obviously unusual but also fantastically appreciated by our family and staff, the donation is heading to the Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution for whom we try to raise money each year. So to whoever put it there a big thank you.
+[[File:On The Farm Sep 19 01.jpg|thumb]]
 '''Hallmark August 2019.'''  Report by Richard West.
@@ Line 463: / Line 453: @@
 We have recently bought a weigh tray for weighing the cattle for various management reasons. It has had a use that hadn’t been foreseen. Princes Risborough Young Farmers has a Ladies Tug of War team which had to weigh under 550 kg collectively to qualify for competition. The weigh tray was perfect for all to get on at once they came in about 10 kg under the weight I believe. Princes Risborough is holding the county countryside rally again this year on June 1st, at Bledlow. As I said before this is a really good fun day out for anyone and I urge you to consider putting the date in your diary. It would be especially good to support half a tonne of Risborough ladies trying their best in the tug of war!
-Hallmark February 2019.  Report by Richard West
+'''Hallmark February 2019'''.  Report by Richard West