THE DORSET FARMER

Welcome to our farm

Provost Farm is home to our 350-strong dairy herd and the award-winning Uncommon Pig

Our cows, who enjoy the outdoor life on our 500 acre farm for as much of the year as possible, produce milk for renowned sixth-generation farmhouse cheddar cheesemakers, Barber’s of Ditcheat, and are fed mainly on a forage-based diet.

Alongside the dairy herd, our award-winning Uncommon Pig Berkshire rare breed, free range pigs are outdoor reared in paddocks with constant access to both their favourite wallow holes and warm straw-bedded pig huts. They produce exceptional meat that has been recognised with Gold Great Taste Awards and recently Best Dorset Food Product.  Our pork has even been presented to Her Majesty the Queen!  Here we are in a lovely picture captured by Millie Pilkington

All our animals – cows and bulls, pigs and domestic animals (not to mention countless children’s pets!), share our life on the farm.  It’s a hectic but happy lifestyle for all of us and we hope you enjoy finding out more about our family farming philosophy.

With small family farms declining, we’re proud that our Dorset farm venture continues to grow.

We love seeing the cows out at grass, free to run around, pick their friend and social groups, feel the warmth of the spring sunshine on their backs and the squelchy ground after a storm in summer.

Watching the cows go out for the first time in the spring is very rewarding with cows bucking and galloping and mooing with great delight!  We personally believe this is a better life for them than confinement offers.  We are no different than a lot of family dairy farms that are run in the same way.  Generations pass down their knowledge and experience and these skills will be lost if smaller scale family farms aren’t supported by consumers  and supermarkets.

Each of our cows produces approximately 7,300 litres of milk per year and we sell all of our milk to Barber’s, renowned farmhouse cheddar cheesemakers.  It’s a real field to plate philosophy.  Luke, being a family farmer, knows his cows’ mother’s mother by sight alone;  some of our cows are over 15 years old and really become part of the farm history.

Luke was brought up on the Trowbridge family dairy farm.  Like most farmers’ sons, he spent his holidays and weekends with his father and grandfather working on the farm.  His other grandparents were also dairy farmers but had the added attraction of having some arable crops – so he, his cousins and siblings spent a lot of time at the ‘Meaden school of farming’ in Puddletown.

They now farm at Stour Provost and have 350 dairy cows, four children, scores of rare breed pigs and chickens.  Luke also has a lot less hair!

We hope our business will help promote all that is good about small to medium sized farms. By choosing our products you are also supporting sustainable British farming.