Back in Minions, the winters were wet beyond wet. People here keep telling us that a Devonian winter is wet too but we know it won’t be as bad as we had it in Cornwall. To begin with our soil is not as compact, we have more land so hopefully we won’t get as much poaching AND as we are not on the edge of the moor nor as high, we are no longer the first 'dumping ground' for the Atlantic weather.
Nonetheless, our land will get a lot of rain and no matter how much land anyone has, there are always going to be pressure points around gates and field entrances/exits. Our current hope is that the 4-acre will be our main ‘winter’ field as that is the driest. We also hope that we can keep the cows outside and not bring them in at all. The goats will definitely want to come in when it rains and we imagine the alpacas will make use of the field shelters or hedges (as indeed will the cows and sheep if it gets too bad).
Whether the animals are inside or outside however, they will need hay. Many will continue to eat whatever grass they can but nutritionally they won’t get a lot from it. Last week therefore we piled as much hay as we could into the back of our barn - 80 bales in fact - along with 60 straw. We have no real idea how much hay the cows will get through having never kept cows before, but we imagine it could be a lot – several bales a week we imagine. The goats, sheep and alpacas will probably eat a good half to three quarters of a bale between them each day as well. We don’t envisage the 80 bales will last all winter but we are lucky enough to have several suppliers who, if needs be, can get us stocked up again!!
AND whatever happens this year (and we plan to keep good records of hay usage) won’t necessarily help us next year when grass growing and weather in general could be totally different… the joys of smallholding…