I had a rubbish scanning result this year and it caught me completely off guard.
We did everything that is recommended — ewes were flushed on to fresh pastures, we’d vaccinated and given all other relevant treatments, we changed rud between cycles and we put sweeper tups out after that.
There was no indication something had gone wrong and it left us investigating any other problems within the flock, or whether it really was just “one of those years” or a factor out of our control.
I was worried about highlighting it to even more people due to the judgement, backlash and whispers that will probably follow, but I thought to myself if I can open up to 180,000 people online then I also can to the readers of the Herald.
You’re probably asking why I would draw attention to what is seen in the eyes of many people — and my own — as a failure. Well it’s definitely not to spread farming knowledge, it’s to highlight one thing — these things happen.
I’ve beaten myself up about it, but I began reading through the responses to my post online. There were hundreds of messages that similar things had happened to them and highlighting an overall drop of 20 per cent industry-wide this year. Not only that but I had messages that just said ‘thank you’ for speaking out about it.
I am not too proud to put my hands up and say “this year didn’t go so well”. However, what I realised was that within this industry there is a constant pressure to always be winning. And when someone isn’t, it is not long until others are having their opinion or snigger on why or how, often in an extremely unhelpful way.
So instead of creating a safe place to share and learn, it can so often leave farmers feeling alone and a failure while becoming a more closed book than before.
As an industry we can be truly amazing at supporting one another, but we have to work hard to reset attitudes and stop making judgements.
Instead of criticising, we need to offer advice and share knowledge and reassurance. There is a reason we don’t talk about the bad things within this industry and that’s because of the fear of judgement.
I guess the question is, are you a person somebody else can open up to and share with, or do people tend to avoid these conversations with you? I put my “big girl pants on” to share this far and wide and it has helped shift my attitude towards the situation completely.
Instead of feeling sorry for myself, I found a different way. High cast ewe prices have meant I can replace the geld ewes with in-lamb ewes for near enough the same price.
In fact, I’ve made money on some of the geld ewes. A negative, turned into a positive — the flock is now younger overall and we stride towards lambing 2022 with a better mindset than we did last week.
