Farm on the Wyre
Here at Lower Swainshead we are dedicated to nature-friendly farming; producing wool-shedding sheep and native breed cattle in the Forest of Bowland
About Us.
Bek and Martina are the current tenants and custodians of Lower Swainshead. Bek is the third generation to farm here; the land having been farmed by her uncle and grandfather before her. Although she never originally envisaged a career in farming, Bek's background in ecological consultancy, combined with Martina's career in dog training - with a specialism in Border Collies - made the move feel like a natural step (or should that be leap!?).
Their approach to farming focuses on reducing environmental impacts, enhancing biodiversity, and producing food sustainably, all while preserving rare native breeds. The cattle and sheep are managed in a way that is gentle on the land with the aim of benefitting biodiversity of flora and fauna across our pastures and woodland.
Cattle
We are working on building a small herd of Dexter and Riggit Galloway cattle. We plan to produce animals to help preserve these rare native breeds, while they help manage our land with their grazing and trampling!
Pictured above is Quail, one of our riggits.
Sheep
Our main sheep flock are a wool-shedding composite. We chose these as they are hardy, natural, easy lambing, and they shed their wool instead of needing to be sheared! This has multiple benefits including making them less prone to fly-strike, so we use fewer anti-paraciticides. We are also trying to breed towards sheep with better worm-resistance for the same reason - to reduce our impact on the environment including the insect life on the farm.
Primitive Sheep
We also have small flocks of native primitive sheep - pedigree Shetlands and Hebrideans. These small, hardy sheep have such great personalities and as they are light-footed and less selective grazers than most sheep, they are great for managing our species-rich grasslands alongside the cattle.
Poultry
We keep a number of chickens of some more unusual breeds - Ayam Cemani, Hedemora, and Shetlands, as well as a few Svarthona. They keep us well-stocked with eggs, and hopefully in the future we will produce chicks of some of these breeds to sell to other interested chicken keepers!
Dogs
We have a number of pet and working dogs, who live with us as part of our family. Martina is a dog trainer, and focuses on training her collies in European-style competitive obedience as well as training them to be useful sheepdogs on the farm.
Meadows
We have two fields which are classified as priority-habitat species-rich grasslands. These traditional hay meadows, bursting with a diversity of flowers and insects, have seen a serious decline since the 1950s with the intensification of agriculture. We are proud to be custodians of these beautiful, diverse habitats.
Wildlife
We have plenty of wildlife on the farm which we try to monitor as best we can! We know our ponds are full of amphibians including frogs, toads and palmate newts, and the summer skies are home to bats of at least five different species. Our trial cameras have picked up gems like breeding barn owls and even otters!
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