Richard and Jane Scott had put together an extensive and varied itinerary for us. With this to look forward to 30 of us descended on the Horse and Jockey hotel for dinner on Thursday evening to get the tour underway. We met Jo, our guide for the weekend, and enjoyed meeting new and old friends. Richard welcomed everyone and offered the immortal words “it’s a long way…”
First up was a visit to a local dairy farm that had diversified into cheese making with great success. Cashel Blue has grown from making cheese in the kitchen to a purpose-built building erected in 2011. Louis our host, ran through the history and the cheese making process including tasting the different stages. The tasting boards were soon bare of cheese!
With farming and horses being so closely entwinned through history we stopped in at the horse museum in Fethard, showcasing the history and breeding of the Irish farm horses and crossover into racing. The afternoon was one of the highlights of the trip with a private tour of the Coolmore stud farm. Richard and Jane’s friendship with Timmy had been our link to Tipperary and particularly the fixer for the Coolmore visit. From the bus the character of the fields changed as we drove out of Fethard and it was clear that they all belonged to an estate with a fastidious attention to detail in every aspect. Care and thought were evident everywhere you looked. Grass in the paddocks was managed with cattle and sheep in reduced numbers to provide the horses with perfect conditions. With the main entrance to the best stallions featuring bronzes of the most successful of the studs lineage. Jason our host talked through the lines and huge successes that have resulted from the offspring. All of the layout and operation of the stud pays careful attention to biosecurity and keeping an ordered routine for the stallions. With servings up to four times a day the operation is slick with preparation areas and teasers so that mares only meet the stallions if they are 100% fit and ready. Prices for the best stallions are up to 300,000 euro for siring a foal with a “no foal, no fee” guarantee. It was interesting to hear that AI is not permitted in the horse breeding industry, one of the reasons was due to fashions changing over time and needing the variation that natural breeding brings.
With time marching on we never got onto the farming side of the business, although several thousand acres at that! Supper that evening was in Fethard at McCarthy’s pub, restaurant and undertakers! Fortunately the food and company were in no need of the pub’s third service! A walk around the town walls dating back to Cromwell’s invasion finished the day.
Tommy Tierney took time out of his weekend to show us what he was doing on his regenerative farm. With a limestone base to most of the area soils are free draining and have been improving with his no-till approach. He is a firm advocate of trying different approaches and concocts his own blends of nutrients to apply through the sprayer to his growing crops. Fermented dead fish were one of his punchier ingredients, requiring a firm constitution to add those into the brew. Tommy spoke freely about his successes and hurdles. His previous occupation as a plumber coming in handy when the sprayer needed dismantling to clear a gloopy blend gone wrong. He was first to admit that his yields weren’t as good as his neighbours but his margins were, due to his far smaller costs.
A tour of the Rock of Cashel in the afternoon was an interesting look at the religious and political history of the area, which was particularly affected by the Cromwell’s invading army. Dinner was a generous affair at the Hayes Hotel in Thurles not far from the hotel, which was just as well. Our bus driver had gone on strike and left us thumbing a lift – we think he was watching the big hurling game!
We think that we invented sport, the Irish have other ideas! Hurling has been around since ancient Gaelic times, sharing many features with Gaelic football. James’s Hurling and Guinness experience was more energetic than most expected with everyone having a go at Hurling. Getting to grips with a Hurley (stick) and the Sliotar (ball) was great fun. As the rain began we all headed to James’s family bar and learnt how to pull a perfect pint of Guinness while listening to a local musician. Kilkenny castle was the afternoon tour, rather delayed by the Herculean task of extracting us all from the pub after a Guinness or two!
Our final visit on Monday morning was to Con’s Apple Farm near Cahir. An insight into 60 acres of fruit and diversification from the owner Con. Con’s parents had moved to Ireland in the late 60’s from their native Netherlands, using their experience in fruit trees to plant new orchards. He explained the challenges and techniques used to grow the apple, plum and cherry trees. To make sure that as much produce can be sold at the farm gate in their own shop and to local outlets they branched into juice making, in fact his juice was available for us at breakfast every morning. Cider is also produced in their own bottling plant, although some is saved for turning into vinegar again to be bottled up. With favourable government/EU support Con has been successful in expanding his facilities with grant help, it was particularly interesting to hear how clever control in the cold store can vastly increase the shelf life of his fruit. We saw his next crop of strawberry plants waiting in the freezer to be planted shortly for another crop of strawberries in his glass house, with lights used earlier in the year to fool the plants into waking up from Winter.
Thank you again to Richard and Jane for organising another successful tour. To Jo for knowing everybody in Tipperary, the commentary on the bus was all about the local gossip. To Timmy and Claire for introducing us all to a wonderful part of Ireland. Enjoy a few of the photos taken during the tour.
