The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: macgro7 on April 04, 2017, 11:43:37 am
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I was just looking through smallholdings and farms for sale and saw a really nice one but it is on 1000ft elevation in Wales - 12 miles from Aberystwyth.
How would farm life be affected by that altitude? Do you still get flystrike? What would be the stocking rate for sheep?
Can you grow vegetables? Only in the polytunnel or outside? Fruit trees?
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Flystrike risk is usually reduced up there, but still a concern. Hence the breeds with traditional long tails... Less danger so tails can be left daft and long.
Growing season will be shorter, but polytunnels should see you catch up a bit.
Aber is where I went to uni. Great town, but seems to be fading last time I visited. It is a looooong way to everywhere else.
You can manage areas of shelter using more hardy trees if you wanted to plant fruit, but it's not trivial.
Stocking rate... well, it depends if you're a smallholder or a farmer. If you're a farmer, you'll need to find out, if you're a smallholder then what is the worry? Just slowly build up until you have the right number for the land. Anything below the right number just means more hay or more topping.
All of the above based on my experiences on various 1000ft farms in the West beacons, and on my time spent in the aber area.
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Hi Macgro7
Our smallholding is 1800ft,we keep Badger faced sheep + grow our own veg etc in our poly tunnel,fruit trees didnt grow up here.
We have sheep farmers down the road from us at about 1500ft,they do still get flystrike due to the amount of sheep+cattle they have around.
Aberystwyth is about 40 miles from me.
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Thanks very much! That given farm is about 70 acres and they currently run sheep but used to have cattle and horses so can't be that bad land. It says it's a mixture of improved, semi improved and mountain grazing
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That sounds great! We're at 600ft elevation, and definitely get more snow and rain than at lower levels. On average, my car tells me we're 2 degC colder than the bottom of the hill too. The knock-on of this is that stocking levels have to be less because the grass doesn't grow as fast or as early. Also we need the polytunnel to grow things that others can grow outdoors. It's all manageable though, so if you love the place, don't let it put you off!
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700ft up here (bit further south but still in Wales ) ..... aspect is more important than height .... and frost pockets. Wind reduces fly strike quite a bit. Winter is 6 months at altitude .... expect to feed far longer than your lower neighbours. Polytunnels will happily grow veg if aspect is Ok.
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800ft up in Mid Wales.
As Womble points out, it is amazing how temperature drops as you travel uphill! So often a few degrees colder up here than in our nearest 'lower down' village. Often snowing here when it is falling as rain lower down.
We get our flowers, leaves on trees etc a couple of weeks later. Grass a bit slower starting. As you would probably expect really. Probably start feeding hay a little earlier and carry on a little longer.
Some farmers seem do dock some of their sheep, a lot don't dock. Still some fly strike risk though.
Kept our little flock for about 7 years now and fingers crossed we've had no strike yet. They are treated preventatively though.
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Another smallholding at 1000' here, in the south of Scotland.
Every place varies, so look at the individual farm, and try to see it in winter as well as summer.
For fly strike it depends absolutely on how sheltered you are (hedges and trees) and how close your neighbours are with animals. When we first came here we had no strike for years, but our newly planted hedges were tiny, and we had plenty of arctic blasts. Then our neighbour put his ill-cared-for sheep next to our fences, and suddenly we had to start using Crovect. Now that our hedges have grown to their full size, we have a different micro climate, so there is always the possibility we'll be struck.
Hedges take longer to grow here than down in the soft south. Where I come from in Norfolk you might expect to have a newly planted hedge ready to lay at 7 years - here it's several years longer than that.
For veg, as others have said, expect to need a polytunnel. I also start many veg off in individual pots in the tunnel, then plant outdoors in late May/early June when the frosts should be over. I tend not to sow things like broad beans in the autumn, as they don't usually survive. Outdoors I can grow potatoes, onions, peas, broad beans, beetroot, leeks, parsnip, broccoli, carrots and tough things like that, but runner beans, all squashes, cucs, sweet corn, lettuce and more need to be under cover, as much for shelter from the wind as from the cold. So, get a much bigger tunnel than you think you'll need, as there will be much more in it.
For fruit trees, some varieties will survive at 1000', although it does seem to be the limit. There are several hardy varieties bred specially for areas with late frosts, so the blossom survives. We have one really good full grown tree, but I can't remember the variety, which produces heavy crops of cookers. Many varieties succumb to canker. This year we have sourced 4 new trees specially bred for our situation, and I have high hope for them: Ellison's Orange, Fiesta, Laxton'e Superb and Worcester Pearmain. I'll know in a few years time if they're any good :apple: Other fruit we grow without problem includes Golden gage plum, Merryweather damson, brambles, rasps, strawbs, gooseberries, black currants, rhubarb (needs shelter or it get flattened in the equinoctal gales)
Oh and get double glazing :thumbsup:
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The accepted standard is a drop of 2C per 1,000 feet (pilot training). However the ground effect will keep that cold longer.
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Shouldn't be that bad. It says the elevation on this farm is between 700 and 1000.
What tractor would be the best for that kind of acreage? 73 acres. At the moment divided into 5 fields.