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Tim's end of summer summary
To state the sweatingly obvious: that was a long, dry, and mostly hot spring and summer.

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Over the past week, the grass has just turned a funny greenish colour—a long-forgotten reminder of what grass should look like.
It is amazing how being surrounded by desert colours becomes the norm!
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The animals fared well considering the lack of anything green to eat. But with hay crop yields 75% down and no silage having been made, a warm autumn and a late flush of grass would be much welcomed to keep winter feeding to a minimum.
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​News from the Pigsty!
A famous boar, Ajax (previously of Season 3 of Clarkson’s Farm), came to visit for his summer holidays. Hopefully, his presence on the farm will bring us some fresh bloodlines in the form of piglets in the next couple of months. Our three homebred sows—Daphne, Camilla, and Claudia—didn’t seem overly impressed by his past résumé, but we were accommodating enough and made him feel part of the family during his stay.
From our last litters of Oxford Sandy and Black pigs, we have three gilts (future mums) and three boars (future dads) that look to be of good breeding standard, ready to go on to other farms around the country and help work towards keeping the breed alive and well.
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On a positive harvest note, the apple trees have been laden with fruit! (Due in part to the lack of rain and the stressful summer the trees faced.) This means plenty of fresh apple juice for the café and plenty of apples for the pigs to scoff—making them as happy as pigs in a sizeable heap of fallen apples!
