Visit West Town Farm

West Town Farm

Visitors to the farm can buy Beef and Pork from our organically reared animals. We have frozen meat in the freezer, but also have fresh meat from time to time and will keep you updated with the details of our Fresh Meat Days through the West Town Farm website at www.westtownfarm.co.uk

For more information please contact: Amber on 01392 811257 or root@westtownfarm.co.uk

Find out about the farm by clicking on the map

Text Links

Yard Bridge Parlour Railway Cutting Orchard Stream Tree Circle Earthhorse Copse

Farm News

June :

High summer is here and the farm is very much in summer mode – the cattle are all out in the fields except a few being kept in the barn for calving. It’s lovely to see them grazing in the wide open spaces, with the new calves running and playing. Andy tries to get out first thing in the morning every day to check on all his cattle – just a quick visual check to see that they’re looking healthy and to pick up the first signs of any problems. None at the moment – they are all looking healthy and happy with bright eyes and gleaming coats. Our youngest calf to date was born on 4th July and is a daughter to Noddy the Hereford bull and “146” the Hereford Cross cow.

Mike is making hay today and Andy is fretting a little as the sun is not shining as the weather forecast promised! Hot sun makes better hay, rain completely ruins the hay, and a cloudy day like today means not only lower quality hay but also a lot of worry until it’s all safely in.

Back in June we ran our third successful “Open Farm Sunday” event. This is an annual national initiative to welcome the public onto farms and to show them the story behind where their food comes from. We had a lot of new visitors to the farm and they enjoyed making their own burgers and grinding wheat into flour among other activities about food. They also had the chance to see all the machinery used for hay and silage making, which Mike had lined up in one of the fields.

We’ve now been selling beef direct to the public for just over a year. Although we know we’ll never be able to compete with the convenience of the supermarkets, we do have a growing number of regular customers who love our meat and enjoy coming to the farm to buy it. It’s still early days but we hope this will grow into a healthy and sustainable business.

A date for your diaries:

It seems a long way off now but please put 15th & 16th January in your diaries if you'd like to be involved with the farm's great orchard planting! As part of our Environmental Stewardship scheme we are going to turn West Town Field (the one at the top of the farmyard) into a new orchard, by planting 120 young apple trees.

We'll organise two planting days on 15th and 16th, refreshments included - more details to follow but please keep the dates free if you'd like to join in.

Info +

Click here to find out about Organic Farming at West Town

Click here to find out how West Town works in partnership with Countryside Stewardship

Click Visits to find out about visiting and working at West Town Farm.

The West Town Dairy Herd was sold at auction on Tuesday 24th January 2006.
For more information and to read some of the poems written to mark this moment please click here.
To read Andrew Bragg's thoughts about the sale click here.

Last News

FARM NEWS by Amber

As the recently appointed ‘meat’ sales woman from previously being a Woofer, I thought it appropriate to introduce myself and what my role will entail. As most of you are aware Andy Bragg had to sell his dairy herd and over the past two years has been concentrating on becoming a ‘beef’ farm. I myself eat meat very rarely but realise that when I do it is so important to know where it comes from and what standard of life the animal had. It is extremely easy for me to try and sell our meat directly to the public as I have first hand experience of looking after our cows and pigs and know what a fantastic life they have. Over the past few weeks the cattle have been let out to pasture after a long cosy winter inside, the grass is green, rich and up to their knees so you can imagine their delight.
More than ten gorgeous calves have been born over the past couple of months, I was even lucky enough to witness one birth; they are all out in the fields causing trouble. Our three handsome pigs are getting fat however the amount of space they have keeps them lean. We plan to buy some gilts and start breeding organic, free range pork on a small scale, ensuring they have a wonderfully free life.
We will have fresh meat for sale once a month, which if not sold fresh will then, be frozen. We are a small scale farm therefore we cannot provide fresh meat everyday as supermarkets or butchers do, however what we do provide is a direct link to your food and an open farm for you visit.

WWOOFFing by Hannah

I’m Hannah, the new Wwoofer at West Town Farm. I moved here two weeks ago. It’s been mainly beautifully sunny, and I have been working on weeding the thistles, watering and planting the seedlings and cleaning up after the cows. May in Devon is beautiful – there are a million different shades of green and the bluebells (both spanish and english) are blooming lusciously everywhere. I’m from London, and so am really relishing the different sights and sounds of the countryside, trying to learn the names of all the different flowers and all the different tools and farm machines. I’ll be taking some photographs of the farm and of the progress of the gardens, to keep the interactive map full of images of the farm and its lovely surroundings.

January

A beautiful spring like day at the end of January is a welcome boost to the winter greyness of recent weeks. The warmth in the air of some of the days feels welcome, it will help to build up those vitamin D levels. This may be all very nice and beautiful and sweet and I can walk around the farm thinking that everything is OK; unfortunately this may not be the case.

Only 20 years ago, it seemed regularly at the farm that snowdrops came out in Jan, Crocuses in Feb, Daffodils in March, Primroses in April. This year they are all out at the same time. To have these very mild times in the middle of winter is strange. It does not make any difference to me or to the farm animals; but could for the wild animals and plants who may be struggling to adapt to these changes. Dormice maybe coming out of hibernation too early; bats and bees also maybe getting confused. There are more pests on the farm; more rats, flies and rabbits. Cold winters are supposed to be nature’s way of checking their numbers.

There are worrying changes in the bird population too; in the past 2-3 years some have disappeared from the farm altogether. The cuckoo has not been here for 2 years. Skylarks also; although we did hear one pair last year. There are fewer swallows, swifts and house martins in the summer. House sparrows, song thrushes and starlings are not so common either. In fact the latter three are all on the danger list of RSPB concern.

But on a lighter note there are many new things happening at the farm; all fun and useful.
Already we have one arriving today. The new bull whose name is ‘Anhay Manhay’ and we are going to call him ‘hay man’. If you are wondering why there is a new bull come along to one of our ‘friends days’ at the farm to meet him and find out.

We are trying to get funding for the work that we do here. Both environmental and educational. I am applying to be part of a new environmental scheme. This will also provide part funding for the access that happens at the farm. The old scheme runs out in October.