WHAT a week! Just as we thought it would never rain again, more than 45mm (not far short of two inches) fell onto fields thirsty for a drink. Our cows have recently been fed a supplementary ration, but during the past week all our grass and cereal crops have grown so much that hopefully the cows will once again be able to fill up with grazed grass.

Once the soil became damp enough James was given the job of cultivating a field that was due to be planted with maize. The soil in this field had been too dry and lumpy to make a good seed bed, but we have now managed to plant the seeds, as the rain dampened the soil enough to enable a suitable seed bed to be prepared.

The two earlier sown fields of maize have germinated well and the drilled rows of plants can be clearly seen.

The winter barley is now well in ear and the winter wheat is also showing some ears. Harry, who is growing three fields of oilseed rape on Manor Farm this year, has been cultivating one field that failed and has re-planted it with spring rape which will hopefully grow.

The other two fields of winter oilseed rape have almost finished flowering, with the seed pods now very evident. On walking past one of the fields of oilseed rape on a sunny morning at the end of the week I noticed a number of bumble bees, visiting the remaining flowers.

Richard has been cultivating our Ecological Focus Areas (EFA). An EFA is and area of land upon which you carry out agricultural practices beneficial for the climate, environment and to improve biodiversity. There are six options to choose from, with leaving an area of our arable land fallow our choice for this year. The EFA must cover five per cent of the arable area, with a minimum size of 0.01 hectares.

Leaving a fallow area enables us to do some weed control, with the period from January 15 to July 15 inclusive in the Basic Payment Scheme year. During this time we are not allowed to produce a crop or graze the area along with other criteria, but we are allowed to establish a wild flower or bird seed mix. Following the rain we hope to plant part of our EFA with one of these seed mixes.

Mid-week we moved our in-calf heifers into a field of fresh grass. Then at the end of the week it was time for our heifer calves, born last autumn, to be moved to another field. Moving the in-calf heifers proved to be very easy, even though they had to be driven along the side of a field of grass recently cut for silage.

A temporary electric fence was erected to stop them straying into the whole field, before they were driven along a track, finally crossing a road to reach the fresh grazing.

The heifer calves had not been moved on the hoof before, as their first journey from their barn to the field was made in a trailer.

So for this move we made sure we had plenty of help, calling on Melissa and Kevin to give us a hand.

The route to fresh grass was prepared carefully and once more a temporary fence was put in place, also some hurdles and gates were used to provide barriers.

Usually it takes quite a long time to coax the calves out of their field, but this time it only took a few minutes. The tricky part of the move was along the inside of one of our maize fields, but after a little hiccup they were safely driven down a road to their new field.

At last all the ewes on Stowell Farm have given birth, so Melissa's creche of milk-fed lambs is reducing as the lambs are weaned and put into a paddock by day, coming back into a barn at night.