Farming
We’ve been wild about raising and A family in Stourpaine have been farming red deer on their land for nearly 40 years, producing top quality venison – so it is little wonder customers are going wild for their meat. Venison meat at Ash Farm Venison is quite different from most wild shot venison.
We are Adam, Ali and Eden Russell. We run Ash Farm Venison, raising and selling our beautiful venison meat directly from our little farm shop just outside Stourpaine. Adam began farming at Ash Farm Dorset, when he took over from his father in 1982. He quickly turned the farm organic and shortly after, started to raise red deer for venison. The first 20 hinds arrived from Scotland on New Year’s Day 1984. Our first stag arrived shortly after from Sussex. Over the next few years we built up numbers by retaining young hinds and selective breeding to increase the size of our animals. In the late 80s we added some stags from Furzeland Park in Devon, which is known for breeding excellent pure British stags. We are now improving the blood line by adding some stags from Woburn Abbey – world famous for the quality of its deer.
The hinds give birth each year about May, out in large paddocks. We don’t take part in this, our herd live very naturally in family groups. The grass in our paddocks is left long,
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The strong, gamey taste often associated with wild venison, especially if it has been hung for a long period of time, is not found in farmed red deer. The meat is taken only from animals in their prime and has a sweet, gentle flavour, high in protein, low in fat, lower in cholesterol than chicken, high in
Omega 3 and 6 and most importantly, free from steroids and antibiotics. All the red deer at Ash Farm Venison live in natural family groups. We talk to Ali Russell who tells us a little about farming life and gives us an insight into the lives of these majestic animals at Ash Farm Venison.
DOWN ON OUR FARM: Ali, Eden and Adam Russell at Ash Farm near Stourpaine
allowing the mothers to look after their young, hiding them in the tussocks of long grass. Once the babies are born they live at their mother’s heel, taking her milk for three months, and after that they congregate in crèches and run together in the herd, grazing and mixing. In the autumn we divide the herd into about three small groups in three fields, each group with a lead stag, some young
stags and many hinds ready for the rut. October is a very noisy time on the farm. The stags roar like lions and fight to be the boss, rattling their antlers together in mock battles. The stags also take their passion out on the fencing, which can be quite frustrating as we rush around mending fence posts. After the big stags have shown that they are boss, they mate with all the hinds in their group and we can expect to have some 60 babies born each year. Each stag grows a full set of antlers every year. The antler is not horn, bone, nail or tooth but made from keratin – its own unique material. Fed by the blood supply that runs in a covering called
velvet, the antler begins to grow in spring, until the following spring when it is shed. We hunt the fields to find the antlers, mindful not to run over them in the Land Rover. In the wild, a good red stag is called a royal and will grow 12 points a year. Our main stags will have 32. This is entirely due to the breeding, the abundance of beautiful herb pasture and good winter haylage, meaning they are never without all the nutrients they require. The animals we take for meat have been born on the farm, they have lived in family groups for 18 months. Our animals are never tame, they are a wild creatures and while they can be approached, the stags are
