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Caryl Hughes[/caption]
Just before Christmas we caught up with young farmer Caryl Hughes to find out what she has planned in January and it sounds like things are going to be quite exciting! Have a read here about what she's up to:
Caryl, 26, and her family- parents - Rheinallt (who is the FUW's county chairman in Denbighshire) and Liz and brother Iwan,22, currently farm 660 acres at Tu Hwnt i’r Afon, Llanarmon DC, Croesowallt. In the new year this will increase to 980 acres, as Caryl has secured a new tenancy agreement. The family will be lambing around 1800 ewes next lambing season and carry 350 replacements every year.
The majority of the flock is pure Welsh Mountain but they also have a flock of 250 Mule ewes, which are kept on the lower land and lamb early to hit the early markets.
In partnership with her family, Caryl also runs around 30 suckler cows and followers. They usually buy in around 15-20 weaner calves that are reared to stores and sold.
Caryl has a degree in Agriculture and Animal Science from Aberystwyth University. During her time at University she travelled to New Zealand where she worked for 12 months, milking cows and working on a beef and sheep station.
She has also travelled to Norway to work with a shearing gang, studied shepherding in the French Alps and was the first Llyndy Isaf Scholar to farm in Snowdonia.
Caryl is currently the county vice chairman of Montgomeryshire YFC.
On the farm:
On the farm we have taken lambs to our local market of Oswestry. We decided to try some smaller lambs, as we already sold most of the cross bred lambs and the ones we have left need to get a bit heavier before they can go.
I took 30 Welsh Mountain ram lambs to market, which weighed 30.5kgs. The price for smaller lambs hasn’t been very exciting over the last few weeks but I managed to £46 each for them which works out at around £1.50 per kilo. A good price on the day and I left the market confident that I had done so.
With the new tenancy starting early in the new year we have been buying in old ewes from Oswestry, Ruthin and Dolgellau markets to start a flock for the new land. I've turned Blue Face Leicester rams to them all and hope to be selling mule ewe lambs in the breeding markets next Autumn.
I then took the Welsh ewes with their rams back up to the mountain for a few weeks to let the bottom land have a bit of a rest and I took a Texel and a Charolais ram down to the older ewes so they could do some sweeping. Hopefully I won’t find too many of them taking these rams now as we could have a long lambing season on our hands if they do.
New Beginning:
At the start of the week, some would say I signed my life away… but I see it as a fantastic opportunity. I have recently decided that I wanted to take the plunge and go self employed and start farming at home on our family farm.
After signing on the dotted line to join the family partnership with my parents and grandmother, it was time to sign on another dotted line for a three year 320 acre tenancy.
Social:
My Gran has always told me, ‘You shouldn’t burn the candle at both ends’ but that’s easier said than done when you’re a YFC club chairman and a county vice chairman.
Amongst many other YFC events I went to Gregynog Hall in Tregynon for the county YFCs English public speaking competition. After looking up a few jokes on Google and putting a few notes down we headed into the after dinner speaking competition.
We came a very respectable 2nd as a Senior team and won the English competition overall as a club.
Friday night was the Welsh Public Speaking competition at the same venue, as organised as ever I managed to get an hour off to sit and write my debating speech to oppose the motion that Britain should do more to help asylum seekers.
Apparently I’m not too bad at debating and came home with the trophy for the best senior speaker and the overall senior team trophy.
Challenges:
In my opinion land prices and getting on the ladder is the hardest thing facing us young people in the industry. The competition for land in most areas is fierce with many young people being out priced by larger expanding farms. I’ve been lucky enough to be part of a family farm where my brother and I will be the 5th generation.
Future:
I look forward to taking my place in running the family farm with my parents. I’m hoping to concentrate on the sheep enterprise mainly, producing not only a profitable quantity of lambs but also quality throughout the season.
I’m looking to refine the flock and really concentrating on a gross margin per ewe instead of the flock as a whole.
I wasn’t a fan of leaving the EU, but the decision has been made and we need to look at it with a positive attitude for the industry. This is our time as young people to really put our stamp on our futures and make a change.