Agriculture Farm
22-hectare farm with necessary facilities for agricultural research.
Hall Farm at Arborfield
Our 580-hectare site at Arborfield is home to a commercial herd of 550 Holstein dairy cows. The herd averages more than 11,000 litres of milk per cow per annum at 3.96% fat and 3.2% protein. Cows are milked through a 50-point rotary parlour.
The location is shared with the Centre for Dairy Research (CEDAR), a unique and internationally renowned research facility that can accommodate up to 200 cows fed individually for applied research projects in a commercial setting.
CEDAR also provides specialist facilities for:
strategic studies with smaller groups of animals
detailed studies of digestion and metabolism
research with growing cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry.
Research at CEDAR addresses key issues for the sustainability of animal production systems, such as environmental impacts, milk and meat composition and consumer health, antimicrobial resistance, and animal behaviour and welfare.
The commercial farming enterprise has recently encompassed:
180 hectares of grazing and silage leys
130 hectares of maize
90 hectares of combinable crops
110 hectares of permanent pasture
60 hectares of woodland and scrub
10 hectares of voluntary set-aside
22 hectares of natural wildflower meadows (Langley Mead), which are open to the public.
Sonning Farm
Our 180-hectare Sonning farm is home to the Crop Research Unit.
Our main enterprise at Sonning is the rearing of female dairy young stock, from one week old to point of calving at two years of age.
We also rear approximately 100 Aberdeen Angus cross Holstein beef animals and sell them directly to Sainsbury's supermarket. Sexed semen is used to optimise the number of female dairy replacements, so very few dairy bull calves are born on the farm – any that are, are sold for beef.
The Sonning farm also includes approximately:
75 hectares of grazing and silage leys
40 hectares of winter wheat and triticale
30 hectares of forage maize
22-hectare Crop Research Unit
13 hectares of woodland and scrub
