jordantaylor

well its been a while since i was on here, i just havnt stopped. they have been launching the work at me (not that im complaining, thes hours are soon addint up). i have just finished a 13hr day and still managed to cram a shopping trip in aswell as going and visiting home. i have been doing all sorts here. Grading, painting, cleaning (plenty of it), testing samples in the lab, store managment, running and managing the washing and grading unit including managing at least 3 staff and doing all the paperwork. keeps me busy in the office aswell as around the yard. i have also been in the workshop and on the machinery.

Well 2013 is a new year and is already showing me plenty of new oppertunities after going self employed. This is going to be where i show what i get up to with work and what better place to start than at JRO Griffiths & Sons. I have been working here since just before christmas. I did a few days grading, then some yard work and now im running the whole wash and packhouse when we are loading walkers lorries. As well as this i am doing all the paperwork that goes with this job role. I have also been doing plenty of cleaning and general work about the packhouse while we are not loading.

Hi Robert, no unfortunatly things didnt work out down there. Multiple problems with the boss and how he was running the farm ect... you can see why i left in the calley farm topic, I came back up to Shropshire and JRO Griffiths gave me some work for the time being and now ive gone self employed as they are not opperating every day, im now looking for work to fill in for the days that im not working at grifftihs

Hi guys, as a few of you know i have decided to go down the self employed route as i havnt got allot to lose really so i thought it could be a new way to go for work. I have got work coming in from JRO Griffiths & Sons but these days are varied as its quiet about the farm at the moment apart from days when we are loading the walkers lorries. they are also training me on the days i am working there to be able to opperate the washer and grader by myself and to be able to deal with the lorries coming in and out doing the paperwork and other relevant jobs. I was wondering if anybody on here was looking for a worker or knows of a friend looking for a worker to do relief work, tractor or stock work for a short period of time or a few days per week, i have asked about some local farms but not had much luck but its only been a few days. I am prepared to do any work from milking and calf rearing to lambing, tractor work or even site of estate managment inc fencing, strimming ect.... if anybody can help me find a bit of work it would be much appreciated. it must be about shropshire though due to travel and the cost of fuel ect... i dont want to have to put my prices up to much to cover that otherwise i wont get the work , so the closer to home the better really many thanks Jordan

Hi guys, as many of you know i have just started back at JRO Griffiths & Sons in Shropshire. I have been talking to the boss though and he has recomended that i go self employed as he thinks i will benefit more from this. Also he has said i wont always be required to work there as there isnt enough work but he dosnt want me to go and get a job with somebody else as he wants me available to work there if and when he needs me. All i want to know is if any of you are self employed and how you get on with it. The pros and cons ect.. also what are the tax rates for self employed workers? if anybody has any info it would be much appreciated. i have had a look on the net and ive found a bit of info but none of the sites are specific Many thanks Jordan

that looks great, i like the addition of the bull bar and light covers

cheers guys, well all is not lost ive been to see a few old friends and JRO Griffiths & Sons have given me some work nothing full time but work on the graders over the christmas period and some yard work into the new year. I have also been offered some weekend photography work at sporting events, football, rugby, gymnastics, track days ect... im going to give it a go as i do enjoy my photography and this will allow me to go self employed and so i can do my farm work and photography.

Due to a long list of reasons i have quit my job at calley farm. I know many of you will want to pick at me about it but before you do i am more than happy to give you contact details of other workers who have been there and seen it to back my reasons up. i will give a short list but it was not easy working there i was not on a contract, being payed a daily wage so i wasnt benefiting for working longer hours i was losing out, working too many hours, getting very little time off, being made to break laws, not covered by the farm insurance if i had an accident, being made to work with incompetant workers, not being able to have a say in how the farm was run and being discusted in how the stock was treated. not being taken seriously when i had concerns or problems and having to work with machinery that constantly had problems and issues. so i am the 9th member of staff to leave calley farm in 6 months. I did want to stay on there but the boss made it unbarable and i did get the support from many people and lots of local farmers and farm workers understand why i left as they know all to well how the farm is run and what the boss is like

Well after a while out from doing my main photography i am on the go with it again getting requests in to go and snap some kit in action I have got a few days off work before i go back to work christmas and new year so aswell as seeing family and friends i am also getting back into my photography. I visited an old place of work today, JRO Griffiths & Sons to catch the Huntapac team in action on the carrots while they battle on through the wet weather and prepare for more frosty nights ahead. Here are just a few photots from today. you can view the rest on the Jordan's Agri Photo's facebook page. http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Jordans-Agri-Photos/132780906799574

well ive started my new layout tonight. im using the name of the farm i work on as the name for it but its not based on any farm in perticular. i have gone for the approach of not drawing up any plans or basing it on any farm but building it and making decisions as i go along as to how its going to turn out. for now its looking like it will be a small sheep and arable farm set deep in the british countryside. the machinery that the farm runs is a 2wd ford 7610, 3085 massey and a loader tractor is yet to be decided. we may also invest in a 6290 massey aswell. we will run a small old combine yet to be decided but it will be a claas domi 108 if i calnt get hold of the other norev claas combine when released. the farm is 650 acres. 300 is arable, 290 is good grazing pasture, 30 is rough pasture and 20 woodland with 10 acres of set asside. the flocks consists of around 400 mule sheep with a few pedigree texel rams. there are also 50 ryeland on the farm along with 75 suffolks. the crops grown are wheat, barley and oats. and some ground for stubble turnips and some forage rape. majority of the work is kept on the farm with contractors only being contracted in when the weather is bad or if there a rush to get a job done. i will try and get some photos as i go along s i can update you as to how im getting on

well another update from calley farm we have been trying different dairy rations to find which one is bringing the milk up and we have got it up over 4000 litres/day in the past month which is pretty good as they are indoors all the time now. we have also got the cell count down to 86 which is a big improvement from 250+ just a few weeks ago we are giving them silage, maize, barley blend and some brewers grains with a small amount of straw. we are also rethinking the yard layout as we want to let them have access to the small silage clamp where we are going to self feed the silage. we are also going to setup a race from the parlour where they will be footbathed at least once a week to reduce some of the problems we are having with the cows. we are also considering creating another open yard fro them at the other end of the covered yard so they have more rrom to go outside if they want but we are going to put small amounts of straw down so they can lay down outside if they please. we have also still not used the bale shreader yet as its still at the other farm but we have been bedding down the yards by hand for over a month now and using at least 6 bales per day for the main yard alone. its taking its toll but we are getting faster with it but the boss has said hes thinking of selling the bale shreader and purchasing a spread-a-bale so we can get the yards bedded down faster and meaning one person can scrape out, bed down and feed in a morning and afternoon. he is also considering purchasing an industrial JCB loader with a 3 stage boom that he has seen at the local dealers. its an 04 reg so nothing new and fancy but its in imacualte condition. we have also done some late silaging this week where we got a good friend to bring down some demo lely kit. he bought a splendimo mower conditioner and a combi baler - wrapper . the boss is certainly considering changing his current 3.80 meter lely mower for a lely mower conditioner. were not too sure on the baler though as we are not looking to do any silage bales next year. and it didnt create as good a bale as the kuhn VB2160 we currently have. we did have to get our little wrapper out though as the boss only bought 1 roll of wrap for the demo baler whereas it needed 2 to work properly so he didnt wrap the first 15 odd bales as he was waiting for a second roll of wrap to arrive. i also tried to go drilling my barley the other day as we really needed to have got it in weeks ago, but the drill wasnt doing much good to we got in our ggod friend and local contractor with his valtra on flotations and 4m drill to have a go but after one run around the field he was blocked up and made a considerable mess after sinking slightly on the top headland. we did eventually get it all in though but i think we may have some trouble with various diseases and weeds now. we have also got a new Angus bull on the way, he will be number 4 on the farm. we have just moved one over to our one group of heffiers and had to take one out of the dairy group as hes lame again so were thinking of selling him as they are having trouble mounting the cows due to the height difference

well in other news, the mf 135 decided one day that the engine was going to give up and so that was the end of that one, so the boss sld it for £1200 to somebody who was going to rebuild it and replace it with a David Brown 780 with a loader. we took the loader off and put it on the scraper and after 2 days the clutch sudenly went so its currently sitting down on the wash pad with a PTO powered water pump for washing the machinery off.

a few more photos , sorry for them being muddled up

some more great displays from phil and the family, good to see his work again

fantastic amounts of detail in grahams layout, i have plenty more photos from this one that i will put up later

well here are some photos i took while i was there. plenty on offer from three oaks farm models with a range of trailer containing plenty of detail

UH MF 3085 conversion MarGe gen 2 ford 7610 replicagri huard 3f plough from mandy i got a few bits: sheep handling system, 3000 bricks ready for the new layout, 12ft gate, plenty of sheep netting fence, sheep drench, sheep dog, grass flock, grass tufts and some maple trees cracking show though i must say, i have plenty of photos to upload so be patient with me as it might take a while, i may just upload them to my photography page on Facebook as it will be faster and easier .

well with the weather taking a turn for the worst we decided to bring the cows in now as the tracks and the fields were getting too churned up. i had to call upon the dairy boys to bring the 3085 down to pull me out when i got stuck as the boss man was away for the day. we have been cleaning out the machinery shed as we are having a few sections for the heffiers to go into and we are having a 1/3rd of it for the maize as we have no clamp space left after all the silage. we are hoping to start the maize in the next couple of days and from what ive been told we have got a team of fords coming down to cart off a claas jaguar so i will try and get photos if im not too busy. The contractors have been spreading muck with a claas arion 640 and Ktwo spreader and loading with their manitou. I was at the yard helping one of the lads grease and setup the plough and front mounted press thats on the john deere but due to how wet it is they are not on the go at the moment. i have also preped the winter barley ground but just waiting for a dry spell to get in there and drill it. i will try and post an update after the maize gets harvested but i will probably see a few of you guys at toytrac whoever is going

well ive been drilling for the first time on saturday. ive been drilling a 2-3 year silage lay . this was to get me some experience before i go onto drilling the barley. the valtra is owned by simon payne the contractor. its a fantastic machine and is fantastic to drive, i think its got to be the most comfortable tractor ive ever driven

the pictures explain themselves as to what ive got up to

it really has been a busy few weeks since i last posted not sure how to explain it really, ive done too much to talk about so im going to make it simple Baling, baling and more baling- final count for me these past 2 months is 2269 4ft round bales. we have now got over 2700 bales on the farm, i have baled all our own and ive baled some straw on other farms that we have had aswell. cultivating, more cultivating, chizzle ploughing bale loading and carting muck spreading last of the silage plenty of cleaning - mower, rake, forage waggon, baler, marshall muck spreader, tractors maintainance- welding, general repairs, flat tyres, blown radiators ect.... we have also had big problems with kids from the local estates yet again with the bales. i was out baling all the wheat straw over 2 days and loading and carting inbetween but while i was baling one evening the boss had to chase a load of kids from the farm that were ontop of the round bale stack trying to roll bales off. they then came to the field and for 3 hours while i was baling one of the dairy staff was having to drive around the fields in the landrover making sure the kids didnt try and destroy the bales and the boss was having to watch the stack at the farm. anyway to cut a long story short, we started a 2nd stack at the other farm, we currently have over 400 bales there. i went to check on the heffiers we have there only to find that the kids had gone to that bale stack and rolled about 12 bales off from the side. thes bales caused a load more bales to roll down destryoing the fence to the side of the stack, so now we have a huge gap in the middle of the stack and we calnt do anything about it as we have a few hundred bales infront of where they rolled the bales we are having to get multiple cctv cameras put in around both farmswith night vission aswell so not cheap as we really want to catch these kids now, the police dont seem to want to know which is surprising but i just hope they dont decide to set fire to any bales as they did a few years ago, destroyed a stack of about 800 at the main farm