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Mill Farm, Rise Lane, Catwick,
Beverley, HU17 5PN, Tel: 01964 542581 Mob: 07803 199 449 |
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Hi, We are Christine &
Pat Hodgson and would like to welcome you to our website.
We started wth our
smallholding in 2002 when we were lucky enough to rent 15 acres
of grass in the village of Rise. The only drawback was that the
land was ½ a mile from our house so calvings and lambings were
not easy as some of them, obviously, took place at night! |
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We started off with 7 Dexter cows
and a cow with a calf at foot. All the cows were in calf and we
didn’t have to wait long for our first one. I think we started
calving 5 weeks after the cows arrived. Our second calf was out
of Dolly, who was my favourite cow. Not always easy to deal
with but still very loveable. Anyway, she had a bull calf who
I took to immediately. We decided to keep him entire, had him
approved by the Dexter Cattle Society and off we were with our
own bull! He was called Kirise Treacle and we still have him
today. He is a pleasure to own and has thrown some lovely stock
for us. From the original 7 cows our herd grew and grew!
We now have 44.
We got some
Hebridean cross ewes which were in lamb and then got a Texel tup. |
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In 2007 we were offered the
tenancy of a 44 acre farm on the same estate. We took the
bull by the horns (so to speak) and here we are at Mill
Farm. When we were offered the farm we were busy planning
our wedding for the September, so ,as you can imagine,
things were a bit hectic. We moved in on the 26th
September and got married on the 29th!! |
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We gradually phased the
original sheep out and now have some Suffolk ewes, a couple
of Mashams and the rest are mules. We have 2 Hampshire Down
tups (Teddy & Thomas) and have had some cracking lambs.
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We occasionally send our
bull out on loan and hire another in to get a change of
blood. It gets a bit difficult when we have a lot of
Treacle’s daughters running around. We do sell a few
heifers each year and use a different bull on the rest. |
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We have
just opened a small farm shop to sell our own and other
local produce
We feed
our Dexters grass, hay/silage and straw. We never feed
concentrates. Dexters are an old breed and thrive on being
traditionally reared. The meat is hung for 3 weeks
resulting in the most wonderful beef you can get! Don’t
take my word for it, come and try some for yourself.
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