FEATURE
Tales from the goddess herd

The pasture-fed bonus
Rebecca and Stuart Mayhew fell in love with Jersey cows during a visit to a friend’s dairy and decided to start their own herd at Old Hall Farm, Norfolk. “We've named all our Jersey cows after godesses; Freya was our first. Jerseys are beautiful and hardy, though ours don’t like mud or rain. They’re naturally resistant to infection and disease. And they give fantastic quality milk.” The Mayhews’ herd - 80 Jerseys and 15 calves - are 100% pasture-fed. “Grazing on nutrient-dense food produces excellent quality meat and dairy,” says Rebecca. “A cow is basically a walking compost maker, so they enrich and enliven the soil they graze on.” Customer demand for pasture-fed meat and dairy is going through the roof. Farm shops and farmers’ markets across the country are helping to meet this demand. Behind the ‘100% pasture-fed’ label is a set of values that farmers and their customers agree on.
“People care about quality and animal welfare,” Rebecca says. “They care about sustainability and regenerative farming practices. Which is great, because if you have a pasture-fed herd, it will fix the soil quality and, because the land hasn’t been tilled or ploughed, which releases carbon, it’s more sustainable. “We need more pasture. It takes 12 years for a tree to start locking in carbon - pasture does it straight away.”
From innovative ideas…
Old Hall Farm is one of a growing number of farms that have met the grade for organic certification - and are exceeding it. “We manage the farm using principles of holistic management and agroecology, approaches to farming that take a ‘whole system’ view. ”At Old Hall Farm, calves stay with their mums for up to 12 months. We source local ingredients that we can’t produce ourselves. We conserve water. We use recyclable or biodegradable packaging, and we don’t use soya.”
…to low-tech artisan processes
Rejecting the technology found in industrial superfarms, Old Hall Farm prefers to use simple artisan processes for their products, with an emphasis on quality over quantity. Nothing is completely mechanised and the milk is sold raw (unpasteurised). “We invest in people, not equipment," says Rebecca. “We keep it simple, using the ‘slow ways’. We shape the butter by hand, bottle the milk using a jug and bucket, strain the yogurt by hand. Visitors can watch us milk the cows - the dairy is behind the farm shop. “When the schools come, the children make butter and they love it. You know, there’s so much of the curriculum that farming can teach, from biology to cookery to maths.” As a Farm Retail Association member, Rebecca is keen to share her knowledge, support others, and advocate for the FRA values of ‘authentic, ethical, sustainable’. The farm opens its gates to give tours and host Open Farm Sundays, encouraging families to learn and enjoy. They get upwards of 2,000 visitors a year who want to learn more about regenerative farming, and meet the goats, sheep, pigs and, of course, the beautiful cows named after goddesses.