During the past week we have woken to the first real frost of the season just a reminder that, despite the fairly mild weather we have been experiencing, winter is just around the corner.

On Saturday morning, Richard and I walked through the fields of sheep now living on Manor Farm, to check they were all well and make sure none of the electric fences were broken.

Walking across one of the fields was quite a struggle as the grass was very long.

The warm, wet weather has encouraged a late flush of growth, which ideally needed to be cut and made into silage.

The ground, however, has become far too wet for the tractors and machinery that would be used to do the job, so hopefully the sheep will manage to eat the grass to produce a pasture in good condition to overwinter.

Kevin and Melissa have been sorting and grading more lambs for sale as the diet of good grass is rapidly putting condition on them.

Water has been a feature on Manor Farm during the week. Richard and Ian have been switching off more water supplies to cattle drinking troughs in fields just in case we get some freezing temperatures. There was also a water leak, which proved not very easy to locate. Once found, the help of a mini-digger was needed so a contractor was called.

And once the pipe had been exposed it became obvious that an old section would have to be replaced.

Richard was still not sure if there was a second leak, but it was difficult to tell with water lying on the surface so we shall have to wait and see.

During a morning visit to the barns housing the two-year-old heifers and dry cows, I met our student David doing bedding up and feeding.

In another barn I noticed more of the recently born heifer calves had been weaned. While the calves are being fed on milk they are penned individually, but once they are eating enough solid food, at about five or six weeks old, they are weaned and the pens dismantled.

On Tuesday our oldest cow gave birth to her 11th calf, a Freisian/Holstein male. Out of her 11 calves only two were heifers, disappointing as a cow with longevity is a good animal to breed replacements. Her sire was a bull with the grand name of Julian Royal Flush.

In her milking life, she has averaged 10,313 kg of milk each lactation – a total of 113,445 kg (about 11 tonnes) over the 11 years. The total amount of fat produced is 4,007 kg and 3,525 kg protein.

Early in the week I joined some other dairy farmers for a meeting with two representatives from Dairy Co, our levy board responsible for utilising a levy of 0.06 pence per litre taken from our milk cheques. This is used for research, information gathering, collection and analysis of data relating to dairy cow welfare, helping to inform consumers of the health benefits of milk in the diet and providing educational material for schools .

At the end of the week I attended a crop biotechnologies conference at the National Farmers’ Union headquarters in Stoneleigh.

It was a most interesting day with short presentations in the morning on the science of crop biotechnologies and genetic improvement .

There was also discussion on the production challenges faced by growers and how biotechnology may provide the solutions. The speakers came from research organisations including John Innes Centre and Leeds University.

We were given an introduction to genetics followed by several examples of its use to improve wheat yields, control potato cyst nematode and to examine how genes regulate the requirement for vernalisation in brassica. Leter there were practical demonstrations set up around the room for us to begin to understand some processes involved in genetic modification.