With three generations involved in their farming business, it was a real family affair for the Duncans at the first meeting of the Stirlingshire Monitor Farm. More than 70 attendees at the family’s Lands of Drumhead unit near Balfron heard about their drive for a sustainable future and began discussions about helping them achieve it.

Three of Bruce and Shona Duncan’s children – Sally, Rebecca, and Gregor – are becoming increasingly involved in running the farms and the family’s diversified agri-tourism enterprises.

The Stirlingshire Monitor Farm, on the boundary of the Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park, runs over 540 hectares, with 165 suckler cows and 1100 ewes with most progeny sold the store.

Two cuts of silage are taken. The family also has The Heft and The Hirsel – two bespoke luxury glamping pods and sells home-grown, grass-fed lamb, hogget, and mutton direct from the farm.

As it was winter, and a chilly -6degC with freezing fog, the focus for the first meeting was on housed cows and calves on the farm. The Shorthorn, Aberdeen Angus, and Simmental cross cows are put to an Aberdeen Angus or Simmental bull with the aim of producing replacements, and to another Aberdeen Angus or a Limousin for store production. This year, cows scanned in calf at 95%.

Attendees were impressed with the family teamwork, farm infrastructure, herd conception rate, and ease of calving. They also noted that Bruce collected good farm information in his ‘wee notebook’ but that this data was not utilised fully. It was suggested that this could be analysed to further improve cow selection by identifying poor-performing cows.

As the farm takes two cuts of silage, it was suggested that the family could analyse both. Weighing calves and heifers and feeding the different silages to appropriate groups would help better target nutrition. Attendees also thought the family could look at their calving facilities and make better use of their shed space.

The family runs a large sheep flock and breeds its own replacements; lambs reared last year were 148% of ewes put to the tup. It is currently using a Texel cross Blueface Leicester over the Blackie ewes, Texel tups on the Mules, and Texel cross Beltex tups over Texel cross ewes to produce lambs for finishing.

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Given the good lowland ground, attendees thought there was potential to look at finishing more of the lamb crop by using stubble or forage crops. Foot health was also mentioned as a priority.

Another suggestion was that the family should set clear business aims and goals. Bruce says he is conscious that both livestock systems are currently relatively simple, with low inputs and low outputs.

“In all honesty, we don’t know where the business is headed. The younger generation is enthusiastic and looking to make changes,” he explains.

“We are very open to new ideas and happy to share any new ones with the wider farming community. As a family, we are looking forward to having fresh eyes on the business and new outlooks on how we can improve productivity.”

Shona added: “We greatly appreciated the support and input from everyone who came along and it was reassuring to get a discussion on what we are doing right and the areas where we need to focus.”

Farm businesses at the meeting were encouraged to sign up to be part of the Management Group. In common with these groups of 10-12 businesses on all nine of the Monitor Farms in Scotland, they will supply data, information, and ideas that will lead to change and better resilience for the Monitor Farmers and themselves.

Over the next month or two the Stirlingshire Monitor Farm project will be collecting and collating data and information on the farm business, as well as establishing the Management Group, its wider Community Group, and collaborating with the two other Monitor Farms in its cluster, who are in Argyll and South Ayrshire.

The first Management Group meeting will be held in mid-February where attendees will be given a fuller picture of the aims of the Duncan family and will begin introducing ideas that will improve their bottom line and achieve their ambitions for the farm.

For further information on each Monitor Farm visit www.monitorfarms.co.uk or contact Monitor Farm Regional Adviser Christine Cuthbertson at 07769 366671, or email monitorfarm@qmscotland.co.uk