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Welcome |
Viewmount Farm is situated on the North West coast of Ireland near the city of Sligo. Overlooked by Knocknarea mountain and 2 kilometres from the Atlantic Ocean this is one of the most scenic areas in the country. The main farm (100 acres ) is located in the townland of Barnasragh with a further 32 acres 3 kilometres away in Rathcarrick. Cows have been milked on this family run farm since the 1930's when the holding of 40 acres was bought. Herd size then was 10 British Friesian cows. Today we milk 50 pedigree registered Holstein Friesians. The first cows were registered under the 'Viewmount' prefix in the 1960's. |
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The photos below are from the 1960's and 70's when the milk was bottled on the farm and sold door to door in Sligo. The farm was a more 'mixed' enterprise then as potatoes, vegetables, oats and barley were grown and beef cattle were kept. |
    
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In 1999 we joined the 'Rural Environment Protection Scheme'. This scheme encourages farmers to be more environmentally aware and sets down guidelines regarding fertiliser and slurry use, stocking rate, animal welfare and general good farming practices. Since joining REPS we no longer keep any beef animals and all male calves are sold within weeks of birth. Our main focus is now on the dairy herd as we streamline our farming system to meet the demands of an industry in decline all over Europe. Our climate is mainly influenced by the warm waters of the Gulf Stream and the prevaling southwesterly winds coming from the Atlantic Ocean. This makes for very temperate conditions and no extremes of weather. Average annual rainfall of 1100 mm makes this the wettest region in Ireland. Temperatures rarely rise above 25 degrees celcius in summer or below zero in winter. |
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