I cannot believe we are almost at the end of June. The weeks are just flying by. I must apologise for the lack of blog posts this year, but it has been very hectic, website and shop building and preparing everything for our forthcoming turkey season!
It is a very exciting day on the farm today – our day old turkey chicks have arrived from Kelly Hatcheries. After a long journey from Essex, they look fantastic! They are eating and drinking away to their hearts content and enjoying a much-needed nap under neath their heat lamps. Turkey chicks are very sensitive to temperatures and like the temperature to be about 37 degrees when this tiny, so it’s hourly checks for the next few days!
We are feeling very excited about our turkeys this year, because this is the first year in 26 years that we will be selling our turkeys as ‘Dryden Turkeys’ instead of Kelly Turkeys… Still the same high-quality turkey, produced and fed the same way, but with our name on it! As per my mailshot at Christmas, the only difference will be a lower price!
We are pleased to announce that we have joined The Golden Turkey® Quality Assurance Scheme. The Golden Turkey® Quality Assurance Guarantee mark represents an accreditation which is only applied to birds meeting all aspects of the code of quality requirements. Golden Turkeys® are produced solely on selected farms and naturally reared on a quality cereal-based diet. Previously, being a KellyBronze franchisee we were already a member of this scheme; however we have now joined as an independent turkey producer.
We will soon be open to take orders for Christmas. Our website is currently having the last of the final tweaks done to it by our fabulous web developer and we are hoping to have our shop open for orders by the end of this week, so watch this space!
In other news, the farm has been full of busy the last few weeks. With all this wonderful warm weather, we have been busy doing grass silage for some of our agricultural contracting customers. Silage is always a very exciting time, with the whole team working together in our tractors and big machines, working all hours. We have also been making haylage, and are hoping to start our hay crop this weekend.
Judith has been busy with her sheep. She has had a bumper crop of lambs this year, all fit and well and can be seen daily racing around the fields getting up to mischief! They have now been weaned, so their mums are having a bit of peace and quiet and have also just been sheared so are looking very smart with their new haircuts!
We are now onto the count down to starting Harvest. We have barley, wheat and beans to harvest this year at home, and will hopefully be starting to cut our barley within the next 3 weeks. The combine harvesters have been bought out of the sheds, have been washed from top to bottom and are currently being serviced as I type! The weather has certainly been kinder to us this year, and we are pleased to say the crops looks great, so we are hoping for much better yields of both grain and straw this year.
It has been a very unsettled year this year in the world of farming, but we are all plodding on and doing what we love. Are we worried about the future? Yes, we are, but farming is not just our job, it is our life and something that we hope we will be able to continue doing for many years and generations to come.
Until next month.
Wishing everyone all the best,
Martin, Judith, Richard, Tanza & George