Devon knows I'm Miserable Now .....

It’s sobering to realise that some of the normal essentials in my life, effectively make me a terrorist suspect.  Stripped of these essentials, immediately stops me being a liability (at least in this strict context).

And so it was, after discarding my beloved pocket knife, my 200 ml can of shaving foam and, most worryingly, my 200 ml can of deodorant at Edinburgh Airport security, I was eventually allowed on the plane to Exeter.

There was a seminar on the “Missing Rung of the Farming Ladder” in Cornwall. Its a long way to go.  Seminars usually disappoint.  As a return on investment, if judged on a knowledge profit per £ spent - it was going to be a risk.  Yet I managed this risk by obtaining an assurance that my hosts, Nevil and Rona Amiss - first generation farmers and all things poultry - would teach me the ways of the bird the following day.

“The missing rung” referred to tenancies for progressing farming businesses. It was a revelation in some respects. As a Scotsman, I didn’t appreciate that the English system of Council tenancies were such a vital tool for first generation farmers.  I asked my obligatory embarrassing question by saying in my introduction that I was from Scotland and that we normally think we are better than the English at most things but that I was really impressed  with the Council farms setup.  No one laughed: if we were in a pub, they’d have switched off the juke box, stopped talking and just stared.

Their problem is the move from smaller Council tenancies to larger farms on private estates.  The Cornwall Council Land Agent’s mission was to get rid of his best tenants! In other words, to ensure they started but then progressed and finished on larger farms.  His aim was principally to facilitate new entrants up the first few rungs in farming - 50 acres up to 200 acres.  Using my calculator, I suspect that Council Farms are perhaps a light drizzle in the ocean. Yet they are at least that compared to the still waters of Scotland.

The log jam were the private estates and the lack of incentive, will and parallel philosophy to let land. Some said persuasion was the key .... I just can’t see it!  To expect business people to act on guilt or loosely held duty rather than financial incentive is asking too much of human nature. But propaganda may be our only weapon.  Changing the tax system, changing a culture, changing aspirations, changing rural housing legislation (so retiring tenants can move to somewhere as cheap) - I’m not holding my breath.

So revolution maybe the only way to go. This land is a common property for everyone to share. We need radical change.

Here I am - a small boy with a receeding hairline but without my 200 ml of deodorant.  Maybe I’ll have to terrorise the Treasury with only my natural smell as a weapon.

Soiling Myself about the Cost of the Earth ....

All through my “professional” career - which I have stumbled through like a gentleman amateur - I have had it drummed in to me not to be late for meetings.  It was reinforced at our Nuffield briefing with the accompanying inference that concerned electrodes and sensitive body parts.  I KNOW I shouldn’t be late - and I have been so good recently - but no matter how hard I try, sometimes it  just feels like its a natural talent.

And so it came to pass, I was 30 minutes late for a 60 minute meeting with an Emeritus Professor at the Macaulay Land Use Research Institute ...... CRINGE ... fire up the electrodes; I’ll start undressing!  I have plenty excuses  ... its just when they are transfered from my over active brain to the written word ... they lose a lot of their all-encompassing power.  Being late affected our conversation - I was saying sorry all the time and he was busy thinking I was a bit of a pillock.

That said, he gave me a really interesting perspective on land price.  I still had the “3 to 5 times farm turnover = land value” multiplier, I encountered in Oz and NZ, etched bold in my brain - I’d almost convinced myself this theory should be enforced through Act of Parliament (or failing that coup d’etat).  The Professor had never heard of the multiplier concept (1-0 to me in my strictly controlled, narrow concept, mind game where he isn’t allowed to score).

Yet he simply pointed out the obvious - that farm land is so much more than farming. There are a lot of wealthy people in the UK; that there is a large demand for investments - be they gold bars; works of art or ..... land.  Land is emotive, a dream for some, a need for others, to play out expensive hobbies. Effectively the wealth to land area ratio in the UK is fundamentally divergent from "Down Under" and as such investment and leisure buyers have a significantly larger impact.  

Also the effect of subsidy in land price is significant.  I read somewhere that Alan Greenspan reckoned subsidy was capitalised to form 40% of the land value in certain countries.  My professor looked at it differently - half of the total subsidy given out in Scotland finds its way into the capital value of all land.  Broken down to an acreage basis this might represent around £1,000 for an arable acre. 

Then there is fiscal policy ... taxation ... relief from inheritance ... relief from capital gains. How much does this add to land value?  Also, the turnover of land is low and thus supply is poor.  But the professor said turnover of land coming on to the market has always been low - sitting at pretty close to 1% of the total area every year, for 150 years.So add to pure farming productivity - investment demand; leisure demand; subsidy distortion, taxation relief and restricted supply.  

The attitude of “you’re mad paying that much for land” has been described often, by those that it has been directed at, at the time of their purchase.  Without exception it is the “mad” ones that have been proven right. Increasing their equity and going a goal up in their own mind game with the nae-sayers.

But things are different now. In three years, maybe less, land price has as good as doubled in the UK.  Surely now it’s mad, surely buying farm land for solely farming purposes should have a special neurosis named after it.  Land purchase is now effectively beyond the reach of the typical New Entrant to farming - providing an enforced protection against such mentalness.

In a weird cycle, given the inflated demand for “safe” investments following the credit crisis, maybe the land market has caught the bug that caused the global financial problems in the first place and grown its very own bubble.  At some level of value you have to be “mad” to buy land. Yet the bubble still grows - taxation, subsidy, investment needs and emotional wants will keep the bubble cosy, warm and thriving in its very own padded cell. 

Michael Blanche in Apology Shock ....

“The Blogging Standards and Weirdness Commission has upheld an imaginary complaint against this blog in connection with recent posts.  Their findings found that interminable analysis of the writer’s own navel, obscure references to song lyrics aswell as a blatant and embarrassing desperation for followers, was against the original and defining purpose of this blog.

Furthermore the Commission has ordered the author to “get a grip and stop being a big Jesse” and “that any post must now have some relevance to Nuffield travel or study topic”.  The Commission, in its concluding findings, pointed out that “you have one shot ... one opportunity, you must capture it and not let it slip ..... word!”

In response to the decision, love hunk, Michael Blanche (41) said he was sorry and would not do it again. However some eye witnesses have reported he had his fingers crossed behind his back during his statement.”

The Farming Ladder, or rather lack of it, is a cause. A Nuffield Scholarship is an opportunity.  Furthering the cause through the opportunity is a once in a lifetime shot. From now on ... its serious (well, almost - as I slowly disentangle my fingers).  On Monday, I go to Aberdeen to get my theories on the UK land market totally dismembered by a Professor Emeritus. On Thursday, its to Devon to a Seminar on Tenancies (or rather lack of them) and to see the Amazing Lady of the Ducks and New Entrant - Rona Amiss (NSch).  From this day forward - let’s try and drop some bombs. Let’s try and get some rungs on the Ladder.

Cringe 2 - The Redemption

Regular readers (.... I think that just means you Tim .... and maybe Caroline), will recall I once explained the cringe-to-the-max moment when I gave the Reserve Championship (of Any Other Breed of Sheep) to the wrong exhibitor at Perth Show. It took me a while to get over it but I now feel completely better after seeing some poor soul doing far, far worse .... live ... in front of millions ....  See Australia's Next Top Model and hang on in there until 54 seconds. Just to explain it starts with the not-as-pretty-one having just been announced as the winner .... 

Dry Your Eyes Mate ....

Well, did I "drop bombs" at the Wiltshire Horn Show and Sale? Eh ..... no! There were no explosions, no red rosettes. I got a yellow one - 3rd in a class of three (... that’s last, isn’t it?). A fifth for a gimmer. Out in the first round in another class.

The sale started bad but was saved by my best two tups going for 460 gns (for Furb - see previous post) and 520 gns (for Elvis) - actually these prices were (I think) the 2nd highest in each class; the 4th and 5th highest in the whole sale - but obviously I much prefer to concentrate on the negative. The final cheque should just about cover the diesel, the chocolate, the crisps, the fizzy drinks, the fry ups and the 6% of the sale proceeds I had to pay my sons - Seamas and Calum - so they would agree to come.

There were highlights - Kevin Beaty’s shepherd’s pie (complete with ostentatious mutton salami, sweet potato combo) at Carlisle on the way down; the Marshall Cook’s hospitality in Leicestershire and the, guilt exorcism-like, satisfaction of repaying Tim White for a fry up he bought me 12 months ago.

Despite the disappointment and the broken dreams, it was an adventure and we laughed as we travelled. Seamas and Calum were probably laughing for different reasons - I mean 6% would make me happy too.

Perhaps I should choose a different song in the build up to next year to get excited to, other than Eminem .... I'm thinking The Animals - "Don't let me be misunderstood" .... good intentions but poor delivery.

Let’s get ready to RUUUMMMBBBLLLE .......

"Look ...If you had ... one shot ... or one opportunity .... to seize everything you ever wanted ... would you capture it ... or just let it slip?".... For all you Eminem fans out there ..... "there’s vomit on my sweater already!". (If you know nothing of this song best to click on the link - otherwise the following will be even weirder than it is intended to be)

I've done this before - over estimated in my squidgy brain the importance of an event then magnifying it further through song lyrics. You eventually realise that you've got carried away and that no one else is really all that excited about it. When I occasionally ponder on it, usually in retrospect, this trait really makes me cringe .... a lot. But here I go again ... getting overly dramatic with Eminem by my side ... because the count down is on to the Wiltshire Horn Show and Sale at Stoneleigh .... 5.5 days, one shot. Yes, just to confirm - I am applying lyrics written about rapping, abject poverty and social exclusion to sheep!

Not having people laugh at my stock may not be all I ever wanted but it’s in my top five in the life wish list (such an elevated position suggests the term “life” is used in its loosest sense). This sale though is the equivalent of a crystal clear mirror being held up to your stockmanship ... so in many ways it is “everything”, it is pride itself.

Two years ago I won the shearling ewe section - Steven Wonder, the guest judge from Detroit was quite impressed. This will be my second attempt to sell at the sale, and this time its serious! I am bringing the daddy sheep down this time and humiliation is more likely than jubilation. I haven’t fed them anything, all they know is grass and clover. The fear, as a result, is they will be like Dr Evil’s Mini-Me and only come up to the knees of their competitors.

Below is one of the Shearling Rams that is going - Furb; looking out over the Firth of Forth .... FYI before the non-farmers ask .... no, that's not a pillow case hanging from his under carriage :

Next is Elvis. A Two Shear and my favourite. He is normally not this small, he is just very far away! He must have had a suspicious mind today ... I could go on for a while squeezing out Elvis song titles related to the situation but have managed to control myself:

Am I ready to "drop bombs"? I will report back after the event ... ("snap back to reality") ... between my fits of tears and valium consumption.

My Cheque Book and Me .....

Today I went shopping. The Kelso Ram Sale brings me joy. 14 sale rings, over 5,000 tups, 8 hours, 1 me and 1 cheque book. I was after a Texel, one as bare skinned as possible. For 12 months I’d regretted not bidding further for the barest tup in the sale in 2009. Its index was good and it regarded wool like a a “reet hard” Geordie would a warm top on a January night out in the Big Market. I stopped at £620 to stem the flow of blood rushing from my nose. But since then I have often thought of that tup and wish I’d done things differently.

As someone trying to breed wool shedding sheep. As someone that wants the best of both worlds - wool shedding AND conformation. The trait in some Texels that is expressed through very little wool growth and even wool loss is very alluring. Given that nothing is scientifically proven - by scientists who know science - on what the genetic process is that prompts wool shedding, I’ve often thought of spending an insane amount of money on a tup to do my own trial. Is this trait in Texels similar to that of the Wiltshire? When the two combine will it help wool shedding and increase conformation? More realistically will it just end in disappointment? As usual, I don't know.

My friend and mentor, Willie Shaw (more of whom another time) has been after bare skinned Texels for years. He felt buyers at the fat lamb sales loved texels and loved bare skins. The problem is he has been ahead of the trend and now, in 2010, everyone is after them. It seemed, in a lot of instances, the skin beat the shape in bidders’ preferences - its now an official fashion and that means an inflated price. I am looking for bare skins for a different reason.

I had two on my wish list. One that was actually shedding its wool, was a tremendous specimen but had no figures. The other was very bare but with a decent index and from a highly respected flock (I suppose that deep down a “name” always impresses me). When viewing the latter, I was immediately drawn to him (only sheep men will not find this a slightly unsettling expression). Sometimes you just know. I paid £1,000 for him, smashing my own record for daft investments at too high a price. Here he is .... don’t laugh or, even worse, take pity. The other one on the wish list went for £3,500 ... so it could have far been worse.

PS Totally irrelevant story time - going round the sale you meet interesting people, telling interesting stories and extolling their very own perceived wisdom. Today an old shepherd was telling the story of when a good friend of his was angry at a chap who he had done business with. The shepherd knew the man in question and defended him by saying, “He’s half honest”. His friend retorted back in a short, profound tone - “You’re either honest or you’re dishonest - there’s nothing in between”. Welcome to my world of Calvinist guilt.