September has arrived with a bang but we welcome the cooler weather & rain after such a hot summer. Our boys are back at school & now it's just the two of us on the farm.

We have been busy drilling 6 hectares of stubble turnips & forage rape for the winter, we are now keeping our fingers crossed it grows well as the cows adore it & it also means they can remain outside which keeps them so much healthier over winter. We are still hoping to plant a few more hectares once the sun shines again and we've finished cutting and baling the rest of the sorghum. The sorghum has done really well & this last bit if rain should enable it to grown to a good height.

Over the last week we've had a few messages from curious folk asking what sorghum is and why we grow it on our farm. Firstly we grow it to feed our cattle during the Winter months, it has a high protein & starch content which provides a fabulous source of energy for the cattle, it also contributes to a better quality of meat (low linoleic- and polyunsaturated- acid-content) and has low sensitivity to mycotoxins in the field. It's a fabulous crop to grow here in France as during the hottest part of the year it's drought intolerant & grows fast. We direct drilling it therefore don't turn over the soil & this helps to preserve the carbon within the soil. Once we have cut the sorghum it is left to wilt for 48 hours depending on how hot the weather is, then it's baled & wrapped to preserve and cure it.

This week we are busy in the butchery getting all the September orders cut and ready to go out to customers. We are Now taking orders for October, November a d if course Christmas 🎄 We will be doing a Christmas beef box again for anyone interested as well as all the usual cuts apart from rib eye steaks for Christmas as all the rib goes into Rib-joints & côte de bœufs!!! Please do get in touch if you have any questions or would like to place an order.

Many thanks again for your continued support.

Here at La Perrière Angus Boeuf we have had a very busy month with haymaking. It's been a very challenging month as we had many breakdowns with our old machinery! But last week we finally baled our last field of hay on our rented land which was a huge relief! We just have our sorghum to cut now on our farm but it is not quite ready. Thankfully we have just had a couple of days of rain which will do it good and give us a bit more growth.

The cattle are doing well & the second group of cows are calving out in their field & producing some very good, strong, mainly heifer calves which we are thrilled to bits about.

We have been consistently rotating our groups of cattle round the fields on our farm this year and it's proving to be a huge success.

Today we are busy in the butchery getting our August orders ready to go out with Chronofresh and be collected by our customers. Our order books are now open for September/October/November & Christmas as we have been inundated with orders!!

Many thanks to each and everyone of you for your continued support, we couldn't do any of this without all of you.

Look forward to hearing from you all with orders on the run up to Christmas.

Is it July already!! Where has the time gone this year & what a year it has been so far. We have faced so many challenges this year with the weather & by now should have our fields all drilled, seed in the ground & haymaking done however this is not the case this year!! Climate change is starting to affect us and how things have to get done here, with this and ever breaking down tractors and machinery we seem to be faced with new challenges each day!! But it only makes us more determined!! Thankfully having strong 13 year old twin boys means lots of help with farmwork when they are home so this is a huge positive!! Life is certainly never dull here!!

The first part of calving was hugely successful & we had lots of very strong healthy calves born to very proud mums!! The cattle are now all out on grass in groups and are rotated round regularly, enjoying life amongst the nature & wildlife here. They remain with their mums in small groups for as long as possible as this is far less stressful for them & gives them the best possible start in life.

We made the decision not to do any butchery this month due to having so much fieldwork to do but already have a carcass booked for August and a long list of orders!! Our order books are now being filled up for September & October !!

We are hoping to hold a 'Posh-Kebab' evening here in August but will just see how we get on with haymaking & fieldwork first!! Keep you fingers crossed & send us your positive vibes please!!!

So thankful for the recent rain!! Better late than never. Its seems to have been all around us but never falling here!!

Summer on the farm this year has been a challenge!! After an intense haymaking & silaging time we started feeding our winter bales 6 weeks ago to our cattle as the ground was so dry and the grass had stopped growing! Always a nail-biting situation! However, the cattle have continued to grow and thrive well & we have had 35 healthy strong calves born, including 2 sets of twins all born outside in the fields.

The summer months are always busy as we also cater at lots of summer fêtes & our fabulous local Market at Les Hérolles with our 'Posh-Kebabs'

Work has now started in the fields preparing for our late summer seed drilling which will provide more winter feed for the cows in the fields. Today's rain has been very welcoming and we now look forward to some sun to help grow the grass and germinate the winter crops.

Here at La Perrière we are celebrating being here in France for 7 years. When we moved in January 2016 we brought with us our prize wining pedigree Aberdeen Angus bull & 8 of our best breeding cows, 7 years later we now have 135 cows, 110 of them have been born and raised here.

Home for the animals is perfect, lush pastures in unspoilt countryside, room to allow us to expand our herd and give them the very best living conditions. That was our first priority.

Our next goal was to equip a state of the art butchery where we could hang our meat for 30 days prior to butchering it. We produce both British and French cuts of beef, everything from Fillet steak to Merlan which we think is one of the reasons that we now have such a wide range of customers who live all over France. Our Grass Aberdeen Angus beef can now be delivered across the whole of France using Chronofresh delivery service, or customers are welcome to place orders and collect straight from our farm by appointment. We have our fresh beef available every month starting February/March time.

When we first moved here, home for us was not quite so luxurious. Our 250 year old stone farmhouse hadn’t been updated for at least 50 years. Coping without the modern amenities (like a washing machine and hot water) was a bit difficult with 4 year old twin boys whose favourite past time was playing in the mud no matter what the weather.

We had a fabulous Christmas and were very busy in our butchery getting orders of our fresh grass-fed Aberdeen Angus boeuf out to customers all across France, i know many of you have bought our beef after seeing my news updates on here so thank you for your support & for following our adventures on our farm.

This year is an exciting year for us as we are about to embark on having a farm open day & starting to do some farm catering events which we will open up to the public, so please watch this space for more exciting news about this.We will also be doing a few local markets with our Grass-fed Aberdeen Angus Posh-Kebabs and will now be found in the undercover food hall at Les Herolles monthly market in Vienne -86 on the 29th of every month starting from April.

As many of you know I love cooking and am often posting photos of the delicious meals i cook using our beef, as many of you have requested the recipes these are slowly being added to our website for you to try so again please do follow us @laperrierangusboeuf on our Facebook page or Instagram page and check back here for updates. We also love receiving your photos and reviews when you've cooked our beef or tried our recipes so please keep these coming!!

This time of year is always busy as we spend our days feeding the cattle the hay, sorghum & silage we've made during the summer months. Some of our cattle are also fed on stubble turnips which we strip graze each day, this means they get a certain amount to feed off. Stubble turnips play a very important role on our farm not just to feed the cattle & give them a very nutritious diet but also to feed the soil converting the biomass & energy from the plants & returning it into the soil. The major reason we use stubbles and sorghum on our farm is they are both brilliant plants at aiding soil drainage and soil conditioning. Their roots are natural decompacters helping to improve soil water drainage and soil structure without the use of heavy machinery and diesel. As you can see from my photos our cattle certainly love eating them.

Thank you to everyone for your support over the last year. Please continue to follow us on our journey & Look forward to hearing from you over the next year. Xx Hannah & Duncan