Lucy takes on a tenancy and motherhood in one year

At the age of 29 she took on the tenancy of the beef, sheep and arable farm in Northumberland farmed by her parents – one of few female farm tenants and probably among the youngest in the country – and in January, 2021, she became a mum.

Now, with help from her husband, Tom, an auctioneer with Harrison and Hetherington, as well as two full-time members of staff, Lucy is running the 1000 acre Rugley Farm, near Alnwick – the third generation of the family to farm it in almost 50 years.

Lucy and Tom are evolving the farming policy of beef, sheep and arable crops, which optimise production on heavy soils that limit arable production, to ease management now that she is running the Northumberland Estates’ holding on her own.

Still centred on livestock breeding, with Performance Recording as the core, great importance is placed on breed qualities and high health status.

Easily managed and productive Stabiliser and pedigree Aberdeen-Angus cattle are run alongside commercial ewes and pedigree Suffolk and Texel sheep on 1000 acres, 400 of which is arable – winter wheat, winter barley, winter and spring oats and oilseed rape, with the oats and 90 tonnes of barley for home use.

The Stabiliser are very quiet and have a great temperament and fit the system at Rugley Ref:RH110521046 Rob Haining / The Scottish Farmer...

Lucy came home to work at Rugley, which was tenanted by her parents, Alan and Lorna Jackson, five years ago. Her parents took on the tenancy in 1994 when Lucy, the youngest of four daughters, was just three.

“At that time, I didn’t know if I would have anyone to succeed me in the tenancy,” said Alan. “Lucy had gained a lot of experience with her travels and achieved so much already. Lorna and I are immensely proud of her."

After leaving school, Lucy travelled in South Africa and worked in New Zealand before going to Reading University, where she did a BSc in Agricultural Business Management.

Gaining further experience, she worked on cattle ranches in Canada for almost a year. On her return to the UK, she worked for Mole Valley Farmers, in north Cumbria, living with the Brough family, near Caldbeck.

In 2019, Lucy married Tom Story, who had been an auctioneer with Harrison and Hetherington for 13 years working in St Boswells and Wooler, and whose family farms at Canonbie. Their son, Finn, was born in January, almost two weeks later than expected.

Stabiliser cattle allows Lucy to maintain a closed herd while still retaining some hybrid vigour, producing low maintenance cows that are easy to handle and make maximum use of forage Ref:RH110521047 Rob Haining / The Scottish Farmer...

“I had always worked on the farm growing up and I went to university to study agriculture. Farming was always something I wanted to do but I also wanted to travel and get a bit of experience elsewhere,” said Lucy.

“I took on the tenancy in March, 2020 and dad worked through with mum doing the paperwork until the end of the financial year,” she said. “Dad was here all the time last year and they have both been a huge help with the hand over of the business. It was always going to be a gradual thing.

“Their plan was to enjoy travel and to visit my eldest sister who lives in Australia, but all that has been put on hold with Covid-19,” said Lucy.

Her parents remain a big help. Alan is still on hand for help and advice and Lorna has helped look after baby Finn as Lucy was only able to take four weeks maternity leave with the pressures of lambing and calving, as well as other spring tasks on the farm approaching.

“I’m probably not very good at giving instructions and sitting in the house. I want to be out there, helping, trying to keep the wheels turning, especially through lambing and calving. And our little boy has just had to fit in with that, he’s already racked up many hours in the sheds!” said Lucy.

The family is very lucky to have excellent staff who are very reliable at Rugley. Philip Dover is employed predominantly to do the arable work and giving some help with the cattle when needed. Phoebe Hoggan was employed last July for 12 months to do general work and at 19, although not from a farming background, is keen to work in the industry and plans to study agriculture at university.

There are also some part time workers when required and Lucy uses the services of agronomist, Chris McClymont.

When Lucy came home to work, she took on the job of running the beef herd and calving the 300 cows virtually un-assisted. But, she is trying to reduce labour input on the farm and cattle numbers have been reduced, with 142 to calve this year. The commercial ewe flock will be run at 600, alongside a small flock of pedigree Texel and Suffolks.

Suffolk tup hoggs which will be used as stock tups on the commercial flock Ref:RH110521048 Rob Haining / The Scottish Farmer...

Alan and Lorna had previously been running a herd of commercial suckler cows which included Angus and continental types, however, in 2002 he was one of the first in the UK to try Stabilisers, starting with imported embryos through the Stabiliser Cattle Company.

Lucy shares her father’s enthusiasm for this hybrid. The Stabiliser Cattle Company invested in feed efficiency research and is now focussing on DNA sampling, aiming to lead onto genomics testing in order to provide more accurate EBVs.

Lucy felt this was very important as the accuracy of the figures hadn’t been so good recently, making it harder to make breeding decisions. The aim is to breed cows that have good feed efficiency, high growth rates alongside low mature cow size.

“In the next couple of years, I’m planning on running a herd of 100 cows and I’m really passionate about the Stabiliser,” said Lucy. “It allows us to maintain a closed herd while still retaining some hybrid vigour, producing low maintenance cows that are easy to handle and make maximum use of forage. They have been a good choice and are fantastic to work with.

“They are very quiet and have a great temperament. When we were calving 300 we had to physically assist only about 5%. They have a low birth-weight and so calve easily, but when they hit the ground they grow very fast. Ease of management is very important as it will be predominantly me looking after the cows,” added Lucy.

Herd numbers had reached 300 cows – two-thirds Stabiliser bred cattle and a third Angus, with the Stabilisers being graded up using AI. Also included are a dozen pedigree Aberdeen-Angus and Tom’s small pedigree herd of Charolais.

Calves have a low birthweight and so calve very easily but when they hit the ground they grow very fast Ref:RH110521045 Rob Haining / The Scottish Farmer...

The Angus herd goes back 16 years, primarily to produce bulls to use on the farm and allowing the closed herd policy to include male as well as female cattle.

The majority of the Stabilisers are now pure (F5) or F4 and 75% are put to the Stabiliser bull, with the older and poorer cows going to the Angus. Most of this year’s heifers are pure Stabiliser and the aim is to be completely Stabiliser bred within a few short years.

“I find the Stabiliser breed so efficient and such a pleasure to work with, there is also the office work to consider and with more than one breed it in-creases office time which is something we are trying to avoid, particularly at such a busy time of year and our time is also more stretched with our little boy here now,” said Lucy.

Home-bred Stabiliser bulls are used across the herd which is closed. The last bought in bull was used four years ago. That said, AI is used to introduce new bloodlines for breed improvement using semen selected from top performing bulls. Bulls used are in the top 10% of the breed. Heifers go to the bull at 15 months to calve down at two years old.

Lucy said the cows were low-input and the aim is for them to have a good summer at grass so that they are housed in a fairly fit condition and then have a restricted diet over the winter of a TMR of 5kg of silage, 1kg malt residual pellets and 1.5kg of Spey syrup, plus two feeds of straw. The aim is to have them calving in a good to lean condition and make the most out of grass.

The herd is scanned and those carrying twins and thinner cows are separated. Fertility is good. This year there were five cows with twins, one of which previously had triplets.

Calving began on March 27, last year, with 166 cows to calve. This resulted in 159 calves reared, leaving the calving percentage a little lower than normal as a couple of cows aborted at the beginning of the year.

This year, four weeks into calving on April 26, 84 had calved out of 142, a little slower than normal which could be down to the sale of earlier calved cows and heifers over the last couple of years. There will be emphasis put on keeping fertility right within the next year or two to try to maintain a tight calving pattern.

Surplus bulling heifers are sold at 15 months old, as well as heifers and cows with calves at foot. Between 15 and 20 young bulls are kept each year as potential stock bulls for sale the following year.

The cattle are sold at a premium through the Stabiliser Cattle Company. The farm has a high health status and is TB4 and Johnes level 1. All cattle sold are TB-tested and bulls are semen-tested before leaving the farm

Bulls not selected for breeding at birth are castrated are sold finished at 11 months old off the farm through Harrison and Hetherington, and heifer calves are retained or sold for breeding. “We have a very strict culling policy and any cattle with a flighty temperament are sold,” pointed out Lucy.

The aim is to extensify the sheep enterprise at Rugley. The 400 commercial ewes had previously been predominantly Suffolk cross Texel but in the last couple of years Mule gimmers have been brought into the flock.

“I’m trying to reduce the labour input, so I’m going for a Mule cross Texel type of flock to produce good prime lambs, breeding from some of the Scottish Blackface ewes we already have on the farm,” said Lucy. The aim is to run a commercial flock of 600 but still keep a small flock of pedigree Texels and Suffolks.

The aim is to run a commercial flock of 600 but still keep a small flock of pedigree Texels and Suffolks Ref:RH110521052 Rob Haining / The Scottish Farmer...

The farm was carrying more than 200 pedigree Suffolk and Texel sheep and to prepare for the transition, both flocks were reduced in sales at Borderway Mart over the winter 2019-2020.

Lambing began this year on March 20 for three weeks. “Lambing has been slightly earlier the last couple of years so we can concentrate on lambing then calving afterwards rather than everything at once,” said Lucy.

For the first time, the pure Blackface ewes were lambed outside which was a success, partly because of the dry weather. The plan is to lamb more outside next year.

Ewe fertility is good with three-quarters of the flock lambing within two weeks. “It’s better health wise for them to lamb outside and it helps with labour. But because so many lamb in a short time I’m not sure if we could cope with them all lambing outside as we do so many jobs as the ewes and lambs leave the lambing shed,” said Lucy.

Texel and Suffolk tup hoggs which will be used as stock tups on the commercial flock Ref:RH110521050 Rob Haining / The Scottish Farmer...

“This year, the Scottish Blackface ewes have a lambing percentage of 148% (lambs alive from ewes tupped) while the cross-breds have a lambing percentage of 183%. We also lambed some Mule ewe hoggs this year which went well and we want to do that again next year – they make excellent mothers.

“From scanning, we expected 1196 lambs and we reared 1034. We lost quite a few ewes carrying triplets early on, though, which was disappointing and something we hope to improve on next year.”

The Blackface numbers will be maintained to breed the commercial ewes and have a closed flock. They are also suited to running on heather moor-land on the farm.

Finished lambs are sold deadweight under contract to Dunbia for Tesco from the end of June. Last year, they were all sold by mid-December.

For the moment, Lucy viewed the farming business staying fairly similar to the way it's been run for the last few years, with the exception of a slight extensification of the sheep flock and a slight increase in arable.

“We need to be focusing on the forthcoming plans for Environmental Land Management Schemes (ELMS) and seeing what we need to do to continue to be efficient but also maintain high food standards alongside good environmental practices,” said Lucy.

commercial ewes have previously been predominantly Suffolk x Texel but in the last couple of years Mule gimmers have been brought into the flock Ref:RH110521051 Rob Haining / The Scottish Farmer...

“Trying to provide a stable income is key but obviously very difficult with so many variable factors, this is where the Tesco contract comes in as we are able to plan ahead knowing what we will be paid for lambs throughout the year.”

On the personal challenges she faced, Lucy said: “I have found the first three months of motherhood fairly overwhelming, emphasised by the busy time of year and it made me wonder what the future holds and I often doubt myself as to whether I’d be able to continue being a full time farmer and mum.

“The emotional aspects of it all along with constant demands and decision making, always having to think ahead for all three parts of the business as well as family life are challenging.

"We are extremely lucky to have a good support system and have family close by to help out – but there are many difficult days trying to juggle everything, and usually on very little sleep, although this is mainly due to checking sheep or cows rather than our little boy, he’s pretty good!”