‘It can get a bit hectic… I try to strike the right balance between work, the IFA and the farm’
As well as being helping her parents run the family farm, Kathleen Henry also finds time to be a full-time barrister, the chairperson of Sligo IFA, a volunteer Civil Defence first responder and a GAA player.
“It’s a bit hectic at times,” Kathleen says, “but it’s what I’m used to.
“I try to strike the right balance between work, IFA meetings and the farm.”
Occasionally, she says, her worlds collide.
“Once I finished a day in court and had to go straight to an IFA meeting in Irish Farm Centre. I was still dressed in my work clothes so I got a lot of funny looks,” says Kathleen, a defence barrister working the circuit courts in the west and north-west.
“With my job, you never know what is going to happen. No two days are the same. Things change so quickly so you have to be able to think on your feet.”
The family beef farm is split between blocks in Keash and blocks in Skreen.
“It would be easier to have in one block, but that’s what we’re used to,” says Kathleen. “A lot of farmers in this part of the country don’t have land in one block, so they farm to the best of their ability to produce a good-quality animal to get a good return on it.
“The blocks are around 10-15 acres on average and none of them is too far away from each other so it works well.
“We used to have suckler cows and bullocks, but we just keep Charolais and Aberdeen Angus bullocks now, so we finish them off and sell them.
“We buy them in Balla or Ballina. My father Mike sells the bullocks in Ballymote Mart. He prefers to go to them in person rather than use the online system, so he was having withdrawal symptoms about the mart until they opened again.
“We have three donkeys as well and they had foals recently, so you could say we’re expanding our donkey enterprise. We used to have draught horses and we’re looking at getting more of them, and we’re also looking at getting a few sheep.”
During the good weather,
Kathleen was “trying to catch up on a lot of jobs around the yard with my son James (5), who is the real boss. We’re trying to paint gates and walls, but that’s getting harder to do with the rain we’ve had.
“We’re planning on reseeding one of the blocks. We haven’t done any reseeding in a while. We spread lime on the land about two years ago and did some drainage work. There was a great response out of it.
Kathleen has an additional complication on one of her blocks.
“In Keash we have land that is designated as a SAC (special area of conservation), because it’s near the Carrowkeel Passage tombs, so there are restrictions on it,” she says.
“But I believe you have to farm to protect what’s there because they’ve been there for thousands of years and you want to preserve them for the next generation. People come from all over the world to visit them it’s like a cosmopolitan hotspot.” With her IFA role, Kathleen says she just loves to be able to help farmers.
“I’ve been kept busy with
IFA conference calls but rural broadband has been a big issue so staying in touch has been a big issue,” she says.
“I love my role in the IFA. I enjoy meeting people and I love farming, It’s great if someone comes to you with a problem and you’re able to help. It all comes back to the farmers and trying to help them. There is always something new to learn.
“I wasn’t the first choice of some members, but I asked members to put their faith in me. Some of them have come to me since I was elected and said how happy they are with the job I’m doing.
Big crowds
“We were able to get great guest speakers to go to meetings, which brought in big crowds.”
Kathleen doesn’t like to waste what little free time she has left.
Of her Civil Defence role, she says: “I’m doing my EFR (emergency first response ) exams, but they were interrupted by Covid-19. I have to do that to be an emergency medical technician the guys you see out in the ambulances but that’s quiet at the minute.
“I also play football with my local club, St Farnan’s. We have a ‘mothers and others’ team, which is great craic.”