Southern Belle

Young Farmers sharing their enthusiasm and passion, and I am a member of YFA Scotland which is an organisation for Young Farmers, both past and present, who have represented Scotland on an International Exchange which I did in 1986 heading to New Zealand for a six month exchange, this group gets together at the Highland Show every year to share stories and reminisce about their time away.

On June I, along with 5 others, we represented RHASS in Frankfurt at the Women in Food and Agriculture Summit which was a very busy few days. The Summit was entitled “A Force for Change” and in my opinion, change is always good, great things never come from inside your comfort zone!

Outwith the farm I work for the Royal Highland Education Trust (RHET) and have done for over 20 years as Project Coordinator in Fife.

RHET Fife Countryside Initiative started in 2002, supported by a committee and numerous volunteers. I organise farm visits for schools right across Fife, alongside my wonderful assistant Angela Mill.

Balmonth has hosted visits since I took on the post and I feel it is important to give children the real messages about farming. We don’t hide anything from them and hope they go away with a better understanding of Scottish agriculture.

As a whole, RHET is made up of 13 Countryside Initiatives and thanks to around 80 plus volunteers, RHET Fife is one of the busiest in Scotland. Carole says, “the farm visits really make an impact on children; I often get approached by young adults who say they remember visiting a farm when they were in primary school.”

All the services of RHET are provided free to schools in Scotland and designed to build bridges between pupils and the agricultural community while fulfilling the learning objectives of a Curriculum for Excellence.

I have also been involved with RHET’s Year of Beef which is running throughout this academic year this allows us to look at beef production from farm to fork. Creating a library of resources which allows us to address the misinformation being taught in schools.

Lesley Mason (Project Coordinator in the Scottish Borders) and myself were asked to head up RHET’s Year of Beef. This topic was chosen to teach about sustainable Scottish beef production to help teachers with the facts and allow them to tackle some of the misinformation being taught in schools.

We started with great ideas and enthusiasm which continued throughout the year culminating at this year’s Highland Show.

We decided to focus on a topic each month and produced a calendar of resources and activities for schools from September through to June, working in partnership with QMS and RNCI, RHET told the story of beef production in Scotland. We developed a range of resources for use in schools covering sustainability, grass, careers, butchery, cooking, technology and much more over the duration of the academic year.

Thank you to all the supporters of RHETs Year of Beef. Without the support of numerous companies and organisations we would not have been able to complete this wide-ranging project and help inform school pupils from across Scotland about sustainable beef farming.

Thank you must also go to all the RHET volunteer farmers and local Countryside Initiative Co-ordinators who engaged with pupils virtually while schools were under covid restrictions. The Year of Beef activities have reached 190,000 school pupils across Scotland.

RHET, like farming, is not a job its more of a way of life – my family will tell you that it doesn’t matter where I am, I’m always taking photos or notes because “it might be handy for RHET” I’ve even got them doing it too!

We fall down but we get up again

Early summer, in the not so balmy south-west, heralds the ‘Common Riding’ season. These are centuries old traditions, celebrated through all of the Border counties.

Here in Dumfries, we celebrate Riding of The Marches and explaining what it is all about, is like explaining silage to someone in the city, or trying to explain how to tie a tie without touching it.

Beginning at 7.00am, when the pubs open (obviously), The Cornet, his Lass (the Principals) and 200 followers, ride out to the marches and arrive back around lunchtime, having partaken of several stirrup cups en-route, then to the rugby club to watch the horses racing around the pitch.

The Queen is crowned, the Guid Nychburr (good neighbour) is appointed, the parade takes place later in the afternoon and the pubs close at 7am. People fall of horses (and pavements) overindulge and suffer but everyone knows the score and no one is risk assessing something which we’ve done for centuries. A day fraught with danger, which everyone enjoys and takes responsibility for themselves.

After two years without a Royal Highland Show, we are being told we are not allowed to drink outdoors on the showfield, or the drink will be confiscated! The bars are to be shut early and so, if the outdoor drinks ban is followed through, then the much valued kist parties will be frowned upon. This is some people’s annual holiday! This is not school!!

Farmers pay a fortune in entry fees, caravans and parking to make the event a spectacle for everyone. As grown-ups, we’ve policed ourselves (and others) for years without ‘our mother’ telling us to behave and go to bed and we (and others) have survived the experience.

We can however, gallop horses through the centre of a town, drink for 24 hours and have a great time with friends with few incidents or injury watched by the police who are enjoying it as much as anyone.

And in the rest of the world … a friend of mine had a verbal waring this week for sitting her bag at the right-hand side of the desk, where she could fall over it as she exits her desk on that side! Whatever happened to your mother saying, when you fell of the wall…. “Well you’ll know not to do that again!”