the daydream fund challenge thread

bonsibabe

Hope your feeling a wee bit better today choille. I was so sorry to read about your loss yesterday. At least before she went she had a good life with you.

xxx

choille

Thanks all.
I had some lambs at the market today & the prices weren't overly good, but that's life?
Remind me why I keep sheep.........
Saturday is a rare breed sale (poultry & sheep, cattle) - I might go through & watch the prices, maybe buy some hens.

Lotus-eater

Have you ever thought of selling butchered lamb either locally by the half, or sending it through the post?

choille

It would be the only way to make it pay, but you have to be registered & very costly to set up - loads of regs. Funnily enough we were at a crofter's thing a few weeks back & a woman has just about got one - a butchery, up & running. It's cost a great deal of money. She invited us to go see her - which we did.
But we'd still have to haul the animals to Dingwall to the abbatoir & the go back collect the carcasses, take them over to Ullapool to be butchered, go back & pick that up.
Distances here are huge.
When I was away at the crofter's foundation annual gathering I was moaning about all this to some old guys from Isle of Lewis. They have to do the same - haul their animals over the ferry & up to Dingwall - Thought we had it hard here.
There should be mobile abbatoirs here, but it aint gonna happen. I was speaking to someone from the Scottish Exec about this there & it just isn't going to happen. It is bad the distances we have to take animals.
I could go into a right rant about all this, but will try & hold my peace.
We are allowed to butcher meat for our own consumption, but not for sale - very stiff penalties if you do & you're not properly geared up & registered.

COOLTRIKERCHICK

choille sorry to hear about your lamb, i know what its like to lose animals that you have reared or rearing.... mainly chicks and rabbits...

i can see why you would want to have a rant about the whole situation about the abbatoir and butchering your own lambs

sometimes i think some rules and regulations have just been taken to the extreme and are bonkers...

choille

It all does seem to be getting a lot worse - next year they are talking about electronic tagging.
This year they had compulsary blue tongue vacination in scotland. Blue tongue spread by mozzies - we don't get mozzies in scotland. Because of the timing the ewes were pregnant - many had lambs this year with horrendous facial deformities. I was lucky, but many weren't & it was too coincidental not to be the vacination. England was voluntary - didn't make sense. I think they've now decided to leave it up to us in Scotland, make it voluntary also here instaed of compulsary - so many complaints.

The paper work is getting a bit unweldly too - everything seems to be getting so bureaucratic.

The proposed Crofting Bill - has thankfully been thrown out - it was horrendous, with loads of hidden taxes - people really skimming off big money off little people.
They will try & cobble something else together, but at least it goes out to public consultation. I was pretty vocal at the meetings!
I think those big farmers just employ someone to do all the paperwork stuff & it's all on such a bigger scale that it's so much simpler for them I suppose.
I don't make money from the croft - costs us money, but we have our own lamb & chicken & eggs. The poultry is much more cost effective, but not having a great time with the sheep. It's a time for a big think on that score.
I do like having them, but I probably won't put a ram to them next year.
We need to get back on course with the house build & concentrate on not spending another Winter in the caravan. Sorry rambling.
At least we don't live somewhere where you're not allowed to keep hens, cockerels - burn wood.

bonsibabe

choille if you do have to go to dingwall to the slaughterhouse, let me know, i'm just over the bridge, and i could come over and meet you for a coffee!!! It's blooming ridiculous that you have to trail your animals all that way. You are right, there should be mobile abbatoirs for rural areas to save the miles that you have to travel.

Funny enough I was in Ullapool the other week as we took the kids on a day trip ... rained the whole time lol. But it rained the week before when we went to Gairloch to go to the beach ... ended up at rogie falls on the way home instead! But the kids weren't complaining.

I'm currently thinking of asking my mum to have the kids next weekend on the saturday night so me and hubby can get up early on the sunday and go do a car boot sale to try and get shot of some of our excess belongings that we no longer need. Hubby has full chef gear that he does not use any more so we might as well make some cash out of it. I thought try and sell it there and anything that doesn't get sold can go on ebay!

Hope you are all well. I'm just getting myself ready to go to college today. This Masters course is really hard but I was chuffed that my first essay was awarded a B ... not bad considering I haven't written an essay in about 15 years!!! And I was last at college 12 years ago when I got my degree, which is nothing to do with the masters I'm doing!!! But it's getting my out of the house for 2 lessons a week and i get adult company that isn't hubby so it's keeping my feet on the ground!!!

As I write this hubby is lying on the sofa dozing so best go kick him and make him get up!!!

Hope you have a better day today Choille ... and happy Friday to you all!!!

xx

rhiwfield

Choille, I had thought bluetongue was spread by midges, Culicoides, and I think you may have the occasional midge up there .

As for slaughterhouses there seems to be ever increasing supervision of animals for pesticide and medicines residues, plus animal welfare, tracking, disease control and public health requirements. And this mix of vet supervision, animal testing, meat inspectors, HACCP and overall accountability seems to favour the larger operators. So lots of small abattoirs have closed down and made for longer journeys for slaughtering. Not sure what the answer is as I cant see regulations being less tight in the future.

choille

I got t old that the type of midge that spreads it isn't here, but so many tales abound. I think they are dropping the vaccination next year from compulsary. I don't thin it's a good one, nor necessary here.

There are little checks for pestiside residue in meat - if any to my knowledge.
I don't use them. But I buy in hay. I buy in from a farmer on the east - can' t get it on the west - he is good, but how would I know if he used pestisides, he says he doesn't, but only have his word for it.

The tracking & tracibility is fair enough & who can argue with health inspectors & vets being present, but there should be mobile abbatoirs that go round the Highlands & Islands, but it won't happen.

rhiwfield

I think you could be right on the pesticide meat testing as these seem to be tested later in the food chain, though veterinary residues are tested for in all abattoirs by the Meat Hygiene Service.

The recent problems over aminopyralid contaminated manure makes you realise how the side effects of chemicals are often not understood when licensed. Now I bet a lot of small growers are worried about using manure given that it could contain contaminated fodder or bedding.

As for midges, so many tales abound, they seem to be saying that 4 types of Scottish midge are potential vectors, but as the disease is not present except in the odd imported cattle it's questionnable whether innoculation is necessary at present. There are some midge maps shown and I guess you must be in one of the lesss affected areas.