Our family have lived and farmed in Northumberland for over 400 years and have recently moved from East Wingates, Longhorsley, near Morpeth to High Barns Longhorsley.
We were one of the first farms in the North East to join DEFRA’s Countryside Stewardship Scheme. This means we are committed to conserving the countryside, its wildlife and historic features.
In May 1999, we diversified our farming business to include a butchery. We converted one of our farm buildings into a smart modern cold store and butcher’s shop, and purchased a van with refrigerated storage, so we could produce, butcher and sell our lamb directly to customers at Farmers’ Markets and online via the Internet.
After 30 years farming at East Wingates we have moved the flock and butchery to High Barns. The High Barns flock consists of breeding ewes which produce replacement ewe hoggs and the lambs for the butchery, this makes the flock a closed unit giving complete traceability, with only the rams being bought from a neighbouring farm.
The Lamb Man sells home-produced Texel-cross lambs which are in the top M.L.C. grade from our prize winning flock. The lambs are slaughtered at our local abattoir and delivered back in their chiller van to be stored in our on-farm butchery cold room.
By hard work and diversifying 20 years ago we hope that the farm is sustainable for us to enjoy and for the next generation.
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