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July 2026
Posted Wednesday 1st July, 2026
It’s been a hot one! Whilst we’ve been struggling in the heat, we have a lot of good things in place to help our animals cope. We have plenty of shaded areas across the farm. Our sheep find cooler areas under trees, by the river and on the sides of the riverbank. The woodlands create a fantastic, shaded canopy for our pigs, and our breading pigs towards the farmhouse rest in mud baths we create, helping to stop sunburn for them.
FCLI recently completed their river friendly project funded by shareholders. This was a fantastic initiative, with the aim to improve wildlife and biodiversity in our rivers and ponds. As part of the project a cow bathing pond was created; a shallow pond filled with natural water giving a safe cooling spot for the cows. This encourages them to stay out of the river, and they’re really enjoying it!
We’ve reintroduced our breeding bulls back into the group of breeding cattle. We’ve had lots of success with our eldest Angus bull, who has been with us here at Fordhall for 10 years now. Sticking with the same reliable bull for that amount of time has meant that we’ve consistently had calves born with good size and conformation. He’s very calm, which is another quality we look for in potential fathers.
At the same time, we’ve introduced a new bull who has been on the farm for over a year now. He’s a younger stud, and hopefully he’ll prove to be just as reliable for us. The gestation period of a cow is just over nine months, so, just like humans, lots of planning and thinking ahead is required! If everything goes to plan, we’ll be celebrating the arrival of next year’s first calves in early spring.
Talking of calves, we’ve welcomed the birth of two Red Angus calves during June. One of them was born to Shawn’s favourite red heifer, who gave birth to a female calf. Like her mother, she is a Red Angus and stands out amongst the rest of the black Angus herd, so expect to see more of her on our social media!
