High welfare for our livestock is a priority. Our calves enjoy their first months of life with their mother, then as far as is possible, are kept within small family groups. During the summer they graze the water meadows and hill pastures and in winter are housed in our superb new purpose-built Roundhouse, designed specifically to provide an airy, comfortable, stress-free environment for cattle to live in. Here they are fed home-grown maize and clover-rich grass silage. David, our experienced stockman, ensures the well-being and health of all individual animals on a daily basis.

The farm is well-endowed with both traditional and modern buildings, ranging from a fine timber-framed Kent threshing barn to a state of the art grainstore and drying facility. New agricultural buildings or conversions of redundant properties are undertaken with maximum attention to detail, to ensure their design compliments the surroundings, whilst providing up-to-date functionality. Our grainstore (a large, purpose-built structure) and The Hop Shop (an old wood-framed cattle building reconstructed from a farm in Sussex) have both won design awards. The Roundhouse cattle building is itself an award-winning design.

Packaging is re-used on-farm whenever possible. Surplus cardboard, batteries, plastics, paper, metals and oils are all segregated into different waste streams, then recycled.

Clover is currently being introduced into all our grass pastures to reduce the requirement to apply artificial nitrogen. All manures are spread back onto our land to raise soil fertility. Fuel efficiency has been improved by using minimal cultivation techniques. These save energy by negating the need for deep ploughing every year.

Castle Farm generates electricity using two solar panel installations on our farm buildings.