Livestock Farmer Focus: Jac Neill is training for the New York Marathon

We are writing this on the train returning from the Farmers Weekly Awards. Once again it was an excellent evening and we would like to thank Farmplan who invited us as their guests. It was a good opportunity to catch up with friends and make some new acquaintances.

I (Jac) went for a four-mile run around Hyde Park before breakfast. This is all part of the training for the New York Marathon which I am running on 7 November. If anyone wants to sponsor me and raise funds for Marie Curie then donations can be made at www.justgiving.com/jacneill40. We then had a brief visit to the shops before catching our train home. With the weather being unseasonably warm and dry I can tell Robert is already working out which fields he will be sowing wheat in this weekend.

At the time this article goes to print, competitors taking part in the ploughing match we are hosting on 23 and 24 October will be setting up their ploughs and getting to grips with the conditions that they will be competing in.

The new shed being built at Upper Nisbet is nearing completion despite the building contractor having problems with the length of their measuring tape. This resulted in the wrong length of side sheets being ordered.

The shed will be used to store straw which is too valuable to be left lying out in the fields this year. Also if we have another hard winter like last year then we won’t have to prise frozen net wrap from the bales when we are bedding cattle.

We will shortly be taking delivery of a new JCB Forklift. We did consider buying another Manitou, but the axle on the latest model is three inches wider. This means the new model won’t fit between the posts in our bull pens.