Farm of the Week: When small is beautiful – but it can be hard work

Even a battery farmer would be cutting his own throat with that deal. But the Walkers have a surplus of eggs and cannot sell through shops without getting into complications they don't want.

They do not worry much about whether any of their farming activity pays.

"And it doesn't," says Roger. They can afford to keep it up because he spends two weeks in every five in the middle of the North Sea, checking and repairing the measuring systems on an oil rig. As a business, they are at the small end of smallholding.

But they have influence beyond their minor significance as producers of free-range eggs and raw Wensleydale wool.

In 1999, they started the North Yorkshire Smallholders Association with a recruiting drive at the Masham Sheep Fair in the September.

"By the Christmas, we had 50 members," says Pat. "We thought 100 would be a good number to aim for."

Today it is 650 – half from outside Yorkshire. Roger and Pat remain chairman and secretary but it's a democratic voluntary not-for-profit organisation with a full committee besides them.

Members pay 7.50 a year for four issues of a magazine and access to the association's lists of rare breed breeders, small-order slaughterhouses, wallers, hedgers, rope-makers and more. And politicians and the media turn to the association for a point of view which used to be ignored.

Pat Walker established herself as a force to be reckoned with during foot and mouth in 2001, when she made a stand against the Defra culling machine on behalf of rare breed owners. It was possible to argue against precautionary culling orders, although Defra did not make it easy, and the Walker residence in Pickhill, between Thirsk and the A1, became a centre of advice on the rights which were being ridden over.

She does not have the time or inclination to get heavily involved in politics, she says, but does still speak up when she thinks it necessary. She has lately been arguing, for example, for an exemption for registered owners of agricultural land from any move to tax four-wheel-drive vehicles – derided in the cities but essential if you have to drive up the kind of track which leads to the Walkers' five acres.

They were living in Middlesbrough when they decided to move to the country, 25 years ago, when their son Stephen, was coming up to secondary school. He is now a staging technician for Disney.

They dreamed of a house with a little land attached but they discovered that was hard to get – harder now. They settled for a cottage in Pickhill and waited until 1993 for their chance to buy a field off a local farmer, at 1,800 an acre.

"Nowadays it would be more like 10,000 around here," says Roger. "But you can rent an acre of pasture with a water supply for 100 a year."

While they waited for the right plot, they learned a bit by bottle-feeding orphan lambs for local farmers. And when they got the land – originally for Pat's pet ponies – they started keeping a few sheep themselves. At one point, they had 50 ewes – mainly Wensleydales, but a few Shetlands and a couple of Gotlands, a Swedish breed. Roger built a shed for them to all to live in, on hay, from November to March, and they rented extra pasture for the grazing months.

The breeds were all chosen for wool quality. Through the smallholders' association, which includes spinners and weavers, they can get 4 a kilo for Wensleydale fleece. They never sell for slaughter but they used to sell for breeding and with that and the wool and the eggs, they just about broke even with their costs for a while. But Pat is 57 and Roger is 59 and they have cut back to a dozen of the sheep, which are hard work sometimes.

"A full-grown Wensleydale is quite a big animal and it kicks hard," says Roger. "Even the professional shearers are reluctant to deal with them."

They learnt to do their own shearing, using manual clippers. It took two of them two days to do their first full clip, which a professional with a power tool would do in two minutes. Now they reckon on 20-30 minutes a sheep.

One mixed blessing of Wensleydales is a lot of twins and triplets and lambing can be tricky.

"There are still situations where we would call in a vet or a farmer friend," says Roger. "If you are thinking of keeping sheep, a lambing course is essential preparation. But we can manage most of it ourselves. It used to mean sitting out there all night but we eventually discovered that by timing the feeding, we could pretty well guarantee no lambing between 10pm and 6am."

Most of the sheep live on to 12 or more before the vet needs to be called to put them down peacefully.

"By then we reckon they have earned their keep," says Pat.

Professional farmers have a running joke about the death wish which takes sheep off the planet by a 100 routes but the Walkers have only ever lost two adults before their time. They do not say this as any kind of criticism of the professionals, but it makes a point which comes out of smallholder activity in general – a lot of livestock problems arise from the care being spread too thin.

The hens are standard mongrels, bought from commercial farmers when they are past their peak, at about a year old. Ex-battery hens cost 50p each and free-rangers 1. The battery hens soon regain their feathering and thrive and on the morning we call, Roger has picked up 40 eggs from 70 birds – hence the price.

They keep a couple of geese and sell some of the annual brood. They have reduced to a pair of ducks because a flock meant the pond had to be dredged every year. Goats were hard to get veterinary care for. Growing hay was not worthwhile without their own machinery, they found. Stabling and livery is the obvious route for development and they are currently offering to swap stable room for a bit of assistance with the work.

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