Summer Oats for Winter Feed

Oats are mown, threshed and rolled in summer so that calves at Maesmawr Hall farm, Welshpool, can be fed well in winter and pile on the pounds.

Ion Trant, of Maesmawr Hall, Welshpool, uses this edition of the BBC children's programme he filmed/scripted to answer the question “What do you find to do on your farm in winter?” Even without the live commentary, it is evident that a successful winter – when cattle are well fed, their weight watched as they fatten up – is dependent on a good summer harvest. In 1959 the sun shone on the mowing and threshing of oats which, mixed with root crops, provide good calf feed.

Ion Trant of Dovea Farm in Tipperary, Ireland, studied agriculture in Canada and then took up a postion at the Welsh Plant Breeding Station in Aberystwyth where he met his future wife, Janet Owen of Maesmawr Hall, Welshpool, both of them working on developing improved grasses for upland farms with George Stapledon. The Trants farmed at Maesmawr Hall, the adjoining farm Cefn Du, and Esgairdraenllwyn at Llaithddu, Llandrindod, where Janet bred Welsh Black cattle crossed with Herefords. Ion created the "Country Close-Up" series for children (1956-62) to foster a deeper understanding of the countryside - and, as John Kerry he wrote a weekly column for the Montgomeryshire Express about agricultural life.