Video: Great Yorkshire Show preview

It’s fundamental that farming helps pay the bills but a passion for the job is rarely driven by financial gain these days and it’s certainly not for a dedicated stocksman and his family living on the outskirts of Pickering.

At Easthill Farm in Thornton le Dale, farming operations revolve around the annual programme of agricultural shows. It’s diversification into holiday accommodation that’s the family’s livelihood.

Trophies and rosettes have come thick and fast for the Stenton family, not least for their pedigree Bluefaced Leicester sheep. Husband and wife team James and Diane began their flock 30 years ago while 
running a sheep shearing business and farming in the village of Cloughton near Scarborough on the edge of the North York Moors, where James was born.

“They were from a wine merchant from London who had decided to be a farmer and was selling them at Whitby,” says James.

“There were just three with no lambs. It was spring time so there should’ve been lambs but I bought them because I was looking to start breeding. No one was looking for breeding sheep then. When I took them home my father went mad.

“I mothered them over the summer and the first one I sold was at Tow Law. I got 1,300 guineas but my father still wasn’t happy. The first time I showed a pedigree was at Burniston Show and I won. Jim Cruickshank was judging that day; one of the country’s most highly regarded judges.”

That was the start of the couple’s enduring love of showing and it’s rubbed off on their children, Hannah, 21, who’s studying business marketing and management at Newcastle University, and has landed a postgraduate position with insurer Aviva, Sammy, 20, a corporate management student at Northumbria University and Harry, 17, who’s serving an apprenticeship at remote operating vehicles firm Forum Subsea in Kirkbymoorside. All three have won sheep classes at the Great Yorkshire Show. Diane is pleased by their enthusiasm for livestock but is keen for them to pursue white collar careers.

She admits: “I’ve always encouraged them not to get into farming because you work like mad for little reward.”

As well as 30 Bluefaced Leicesters, they keep 80 Swaledales, 18 pedigree Texels and a small flock of mules and the recent bad weather means they’ve suffered from the spiralling cost of feed and four of their sheep have contracted mastitis.

James explains: “It’s been a hard time. The silage we’re feeding them is not as good quality. Sheep farmers will have a job making any profits this time unless prices are good because of the sheer cost of feed. In a year the price of silage has gone up £100 a tonne because of bad harvests.”

He has no fears for the quality of show sheep though.

“The people who show and the top stockmen will still show sheep and they’ll look as good as they always do because they’re professionals. It’s the commercial men who’ll suffer but then you get a knock-on effect, if stockmen don’t get as much money for their sheep they won’t buy as many rams for breeding.”

He’s keeping his cards close to his chest about the chances of emerging victorious this showing season, which will include another appearance at the Great Yorkshire Show. Wool from their sheep is sold into the clothing industry, so as well as starring in the show ring, the Stentons feature in the Great Yorkshire Show’s annual video series which this year follows the journey of sheep’s wool from the animal’s back through to some of the UK’s top fashion garments and culminates in an episode on the catwalk at the s how this July.

James says: “Much of the wool from British sheep is used in carpets but wool from Bluefaced Leicester sheep is top quality, it commands a much higher price just because of that quality, and so is used to make some of the finest woollen clothing both here and abroad.”

The Stentons moved to Easthill Farm in 1999. With the BSE crisis ruining business, they were keen to diversify into the tourism industry but the right spot wasn’t easy to find.

James says: “We couldn’t get Cloughton passed for planning so we tried to sell up and looked elsewhere. Lots of people were selling farms but keeping the cottages. Diane went to an estate agents and got the details about this place. It wasn’t on the open market but the owner wanted to sell and then lo and behold the land at Cloughton sold too. We own six acres and a shed here and the rest we rent.”

Easthill Farm already offered holiday accommodation when the Stentons moved in but they extended it and built up its facilities, adding access for disabled guests. James acts as the groundskeeper and handyman while Diane is front of house for guests. Their livestock is kept in the surrounding fields.

More than 50 self-catering guests can stay here at once, split between three apartments in the farmhouse and four lodges in pine woodland at the side of gardens to the rear of the farmhouse which boasts views across to the Yorkshire Wolds.

The garden has a treehouse with a slide and bunker, a crazy golf course, a games room, hot tub, barbecue area, tennis court and play area with a cargo net, climbing frame, a swing and sandpit.

“We meet all sorts of people and it pays the bills. We get people from New Zealand and the US. Not everyone who comes here knows about farming, some do and want to get involved but a lot of people have never come face to face with a pig before.”

It’s popular with cyclists visiting nearby Dalby Forest, he says, and it’s not unknown for a famous face to bob in either. Francis Rossi, the ponytailed lead singer of Status Quo, once stayed here ahead of a gig in the forest.

It’s not all rock ’n’ roll though and with summer bookings and the show season fast approaching, the Stentons will be busy, so how do they cope?

“We just keep moving,” says Diane.