‘We both love our day jobs but farming is where our hearts lie and always will’

Miriam and Rachel Hastings were each just four years old when they helped lamb their first ewe. The sisters, who are both teachers, were born and raised on a sheep and suckler farm near Ballyforan on the Galway/ Roscommon border.

“Since we could walk we’ve been involved in the farm, it’s always been a huge part of our lives,” says Rachel.

From a young age, Miriam and Rachel, supervised by their parents Monica and Claude, had their own responsibilities on the farm.

“We bought four Aberdeen Angus and Belgian Blue calves every year. We had to train them to drink from a bucket and had to clean them out, it was our own little enterprise,” says Miriam.

As time has passed, the sisters have become increasingly more involved in the everyday running of the family farm, even though both work full-time jobs and both are in the process of completing their Masters studies.

“It’s a bit of a zoo farm,” smiles

Miriam. “We have a few different types of cattle and sheep. We like to be diverse.”

They have pure-bred Charolais and Limousin cattle along with some Simmentals and Shorthorns. The sisters have been showing their pure-breds for some time and they miss not being able to attend shows due to the pandemic.

Miriam and Rachel also farm a medium-sized flock of mixed-breed sheep.

“We love the sheep, and always have. Sheep are the easiest to handle and we can do everything with them ourselves we lamb, vaccinate and ring all of them,” says Rachel.

After trialling different varieties over the years, they have found the breed they feel is perfect for them.

“A while back we bought a few Lleyn sheep as a trial and we soon realised that they were exactly what we had been looking for. They produce great-quality lambs, they’re very motherly and they have a good milk yield,” says Rachel.

The Hastings run a Charollais ram with all of their sheep as they find he produces easy-lambed, good-quality lambs.

As lambing season has recently finished, they have just let the ewes and lambs out to grass full-time. Up until now, they had been using an ‘in/out’ system.

“We had been keeping the ewes and lambs in during the night and letting them out during the day, until the beginning of (last) week when we decided it was the right time to let them out permanently,” says Miriam,

“It can be hard work getting them in every night but once the sheep get used to the routine of going in and out, it’s fine. It also gives us a chance to do more monitoring. For example, we handle the lambs every day and check the ewes up close to make sure everything is well.”

The sisters have reduced the amount of meal they have been feeding their sheep, given that the grass has been growing so well this month.

“We always feed our sheep with meal from Grennan’s as we find it great and we have just started to reduce the quantity we feed for the spring and summer,” says Rachel.

They also vaccinated all lambs for Orf before they let them out to pasture and they brought up a creepfeeder in case it’s needed.

The lambs are kept in three batches, in order of age. The fences in the fields were checked before the sheep were let out.

Miriam and Rachel plan to start selling all their lambs to the factory in June.

Breeding season Hands on:

Miriam and Rachel Hastings on the family’s sheep and suckler farm at Muckloon on the GalwayRoscommon border; (below) the sisters have diversified the flock in recent years.

Breeding season is starting for the cows and heifers and so the sisters have spent the last few days picking out those that will run with one of their stock bulls and those that will be artificially inseminated.

They have also made a welcome discovery in finding pink tape for their left over silage bales.

“We’ve been using the pink silage wrap for our bales for a few years now because some of the profits go to Brest Cancer Ireland. This is the first time we’ve found tape to match,” says Miriam.

With Miriam recently graduating from her Green Cert and both sisters spending more time on the farm than ever, they say that no matter what, they will always want to come home to a farm at the end of the day.

“We both love our day jobs but farming is where our hearts lie and always will,” says Rachel.