The Outdoor Gibbon
Join me on my journey through stories and interviews talking to like-minded individuals. It doesn’t matter who you are this podcast will hopefully educate and guide you through the world deerstalking, shooting and the outdoor world.
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The Outdoor Gibbon
73 From Field To Stage With Farmer-Comedian Jim Smith
The frost finally arrived, and with it a frank look at what winter really means for working countryside life. We open with frozen offices, hungry pheasants, and a social media landscape that keeps shifting under the boots of anyone who mentions fieldsports. Then we settle in at a Perthshire kitchen table with farmer and comedian Jim Smith to talk roots, resilience, and why a good laugh sometimes saves the day.
Jim’s story starts with bales, tatties, and Young Farmers’ stage nights, then leaps to five nerve-shredding minutes at The Stand and the improvisational chaos of Scott Squad. He explains how sketches turned into tours, how he retooled the farm to handle gigs, and why diversified work only sticks if it respects the seasons. We compare the soggy springs and scorched summers that define modern arable, the quiet power of long northern daylight, and the culture shift as estates consolidate, tenancies shrink, and small farms fight to keep a foothold.
We also go where Instagram rarely does: the money and the mind. Sheep margins, beef prices, supermarket strategies, and the hard math behind expensive kit get stripped back to the basics. Jim shares a plain-spoken take on mental health, spotlighting RSABI, Farm Strong, and the slow-burn stress of a job you can’t switch off. Along the way, we dig into provenance and food miles, the role of venison and game in everyday kitchens, and why teaching simple butchery skills can stop pheasants becoming landfill.
By the end, you’ll hear why farm humor travels—across borders and accents—because the truths are universal: weather swings, stubborn yows, and bills that don’t wait. If you care about real farming, rural culture, and stories that stick, this one’s for you. Listen, share with a friend who needs a warm, honest laugh, and leave a review to help more folks find the show.
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Outdoor Gibbon Podcast. Sorry, it's been a bit of a gap again before we got this one out. We are now mid-November and it's so cold. Finally, that summer that we kind of had has just broken, and all of a sudden, uh yeah, it's actually been snowing today. Uh yeah, it's it's crazy. We've gone from sort of 14-15 degrees, and I think that we're about two I think we're going down to minus two or something like that tonight. I have had to decamp from my office because it's actually got too cold, and I'm sat in my back lounge recording this podcast with three spaniels curled up around my feet and the fire roaring away in the background just for some warmth. I think we can officially say it's now winter, and it's not that long to the uh the magic sea word, anyway. So uh, with that change, I'm hoping now, well, already my pheasants have been eating a huge amount of food. We've already got through two tonne of wheat, and we hadn't even had the cold yet. There's been that much wild food kicking about. Now it's obviously turned cold. I suspect they shall ramp up how much they're eating. So that will keep me and the syndicate busy feeding them. So, in other news, if you've been following me on socials, you'll see that the algorithms have changed again, and now they have really tailored in on weapons and any item to do with a weapon, be that a scope or moderator, etc. etc., you can end up if you have a public profile taking a shadow ban. This is a real nightmare for expansion and growth, and at that point we have now teamed up with Style, which we did an interview with them back a while ago. We had Rachel on, who is the owner of uh the app and that that new sort of social media platform. So, watch this space as we go forward. We'll be working more with them, hopefully, and there'll be more from that. We also visited our local game dealer, and we had a good chat there, and we have lined up another podcast. So you'll be able to hopefully hear how the Scottish game dealers are doing it, and maybe it'll be slightly different to your local if you're down in England or somewhere else in the world, AGHE or Game Dealer, and let's uh let's compare and contrast and see how things are changing. And really interesting, this was all this all came about through the British Deer Society. But also, there's a huge, huge thing that I was on a shoot a couple of weeks back, and I was so surprised that shoots now have to pay to actually get rid of their pheasants. Um up to 75 pence per bird. It's absolutely crazy. Yet the people still eating chicken. It's like, why don't you just take pheasants home with you? Now, chatting to a few people, great, the bags are being taken home, but if they're still having to pay to get rid of some of these bags, it really we need to sort of push that game, uh, get it into the get it mainstream, get people taking pheasants, and even just a demonstration of how to breast out a pheasant and actually be able to get some decent meat out of it, is all it takes. So that's my new plan. So, watch this space for a bit more work on uh making game accessible to people. Right, this podcast is with the farmer and comedian Jim Smith. Now I recorded this back in June, so I do apologize, it's taken me so long to get it organised and get it out, but it's just been a crazy busy time. He is oh if you've if you found him on social media, you will know exactly who I'm talking about. And if you haven't, go and look at Farmer Jim and start watching some of his comedy because it is something that will keep you completely enlightened and it is fantastic. I recorded this in his kitchen down in Perth. It was a bit of a crazy morning, childcare and all the rest of it, but uh hopefully you enjoy this. The Outdoor Given Podcast is proudly sponsored by the Shooting and Hunting Academy, an online training platform and UK registered learning provider that provides a host of accredited and nationally available courses and masterclasses delivered by leading industry experts.
SPEAKER_00:Hi guys, it's Rachel here from Style, the new social app for field sports and farming. Join our countryside community on the App Store or Google Play. Just search Style Country. Enjoy the show.
SPEAKER_03:How are you doing?
SPEAKER_01:I'm good after that lovely introduction. Thank you. Well you love to have you here.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you very much for actually bringing me down to uh to to your part of the world.
SPEAKER_01:Oh yes, I because uh I think that's the thing. I think folk think I'm from Aberdeenshire because I borrow the accent, but uh no Pershire born and bred.
SPEAKER_03:Absolutely. You're I think you're third generation farmer.
SPEAKER_01:Third generation here, uh probably fifth or sixth going back, you know, because my obviously my grandparents' uh fathers were all farmers down in Fife, so but the third generation up here in Pershire. Okay. So we're still incomers, you know.
SPEAKER_03:I was I was gonna say, you uh it's the same being up with us, you you you're never gonna be a a local.
SPEAKER_01:No, no. 75 years uh last November since we've we've been here. So Okay, right.
SPEAKER_03:So that's that sort of leads me on. Obviously, a lot of people will know you now from your comedy stuff that you do on the internet and your and and the comedy side of things. But talk to me, obviously, you just followed on in the family footsteps to go into farming.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely, yeah. It was um yeah, I I always wanted to do it really, as soon as I can remember. Um just uh like a lot of farm kids just brought up uh sitting with your dad in a tractor, or and of course, back in the 80s it was a lot more manual labour, so we were all out, you know, picking tatties, lifting bales of hay, all that kind of stuff, so which was better actually because you felt more involved, but yeah, there was no question. That's I always knew I wanted to do that, you know. And um dad always encouraged me. Well, never forced me, but always encouraged.
SPEAKER_03:So obviously, how did that lead on to the comedy side of things? Is that a a diversification to extra income or is that just something a passion?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I started off as a passion and now I really need the money.
SPEAKER_03:I think all farmers do that.
SPEAKER_01:Uh yeah, so it started off really uh well, I used to do a lot of stuff for young farmers, okay. Uh, and I was fortunate enough to uh even ended up being national chairman of young young farmers. It was just a great, great time in my life. But uh my favourite thing of all, because I've got Tug of War and Stockers and a lot of good competitions. But I always loved the the the stage performances. We used to do uh the East Area Cabaret competition, which was a 10-minute song and dance retain with comedy as well. But also more um we did our own pantomime every two years, the Persia Young Farmers. So we we started getting buying in scripts and uh they were fine, but we would need to make them more local, you know, local references. And then I I I just really loved doing that, so I ended up just writing kind of sketches within them, and then ended up just writing the whole pantoscript, so I got a buzz from that.
SPEAKER_03:So okay, because obviously, yeah, people will have originally seen you on sort of the BBC episode and stuff like that, and and and and it just went from there?
SPEAKER_01:It just went it just went from there, so I um so I would I by this point I'm early 30s and tooled for young farmers, and a few folk were saying, you know, you maybe should do some of your comedy, and I just had that hankering, you know, um to do it. So um I just I I remember uh I I just applied I discovered that um the Glasgow Stand and the Edinburgh Stand comedy clubs to a beginner's night called Red Raw on a Monday and Tuesday, and uh I just I came across it, I'd never really even been to see stand-up comedy, it was always more kind of sketch stuff. I was into anyway, you know, especially young farmers, it was always sketches and uh but uh I never really thought about stand-up, but the more I thought about jokes and stuff, I thought, oh that might be useful in a stand-up. So um so I just applied for their their their slot, I think they might not get back to me, and then uh got an email and said, Oh, we've got this is like September, says we've got you booked in for two five minute slots in November, and I remember the fear. You know, how am I gonna think of the funny stuff for five five whole minutes? That's a massive time. Yep. And although I'd done lots of uh kind of done the like the young farmer's dinner dance circuit and all that kind of stuff, you know, when you get I'm maybe asked to do a speech at a dinner. But you can stand up there with notes, and you can certainly get away with the old jokes, you know, the ones we've all heard before. But with stand-up, it's gotta be all your own stuff, and and really you've got to have it kind of memorised and that. But um but anyway, so I went down to Glasgow and I'd only been both my sisters went to Glasgow uni, but we'd never really I'd never really been to it because I was younger. Went down there. And I remember I think I left here about four o'clock in the afternoon, you know, to get down there. And I wasn't on till about eight o'clock. And um because because you know it's only an hour and twenty minutes you can get down there now. But uh I got parked up and found a place, went for a bite of tea, and then I went back to my car and I wrote screeds and screeds of notes all over my hands. Luckily I've got big hands, you know, but small writing. And I I and I remember sitting in the green room and I I was so nervous, but uh yeah, the adrenaline was pumping too. I was like, yeah, this is what I want to try and authenticate. And I got a luckily it went alright the first five minutes, and I got a decent reception.
SPEAKER_03:So yeah, because obviously I think most people will probably know you from the the sort of the comedy videos you pop up now on on the social side of things. Yeah. So being the guy dealing with the Yows or the the the parched farmer because the temperature in Perth's reached or Aberdeenshire's reached 15 degrees and things like that.
SPEAKER_01:Oh well that that really put me on the so that's maybe like five years after I started stand up, so that was really put me on the there's no doubt the the videos really uh that really put me on on the map on a national scale, without a shadow of a doubt. So um that really came about. Well, I got an addition to going Scott Squad, and it uh Scotch Squad was a great show because it it let a lot of Scott Scottish comics have little cameo roles, right? You know, come in for a show. It was a brilliant platform for that. So obviously I got and I I even additioned as a farmer, so I did my character, um, and then we did a few sketches. I think the first one that was a cat, but it wasn't until we did the bomb sketch with a horse and Alan and all that kind of stuff, which on the day I didn't really think was that funny, you know. Coming away from it, I thought it was alright, but um, but the beauty of Scott Squad, it was all improvisation, yes, there wasn't a script, none of that was actually scripted, apart from the outline of the story. So you get told uh there's a farmer, he's found a bomb, the police are coming, go make it happen. So um, and that that was that was so much fun. Yep. So a lot of the stuff, and I just noted happened to notice a horse in the distance, it just literally next door. None of that was put there, none of that. So and that it was great, so it was a lot of fun to do, and as I say, they they they cut that and put it out as a short video, and then that went really well. And then at the same time, uh so BBC then said, Well, do you want to do some kind of farm short things? So that's when I did the hot video and like the Laman Diaries, and I also did a video um the Five Darfader sketch. Okay, I was doing a Radio 4 show and uh they recorded that as well, so it did really well. So within a couple of years, all that had come to the the fore.
SPEAKER_03:So, how how do you juggle that obviously all this time that you're doing sketches, comedy, and all the rest of it, and you run a full-time farm?
SPEAKER_01:I'll just I'll just go and blow my nose. Sorry, no bother.
SPEAKER_03:So the big question is obviously with all this comedy and and sketches and stuff like that, how do you actually manage to do going out and doing gigs and run a full-time farm?
SPEAKER_01:Well, we've so we've changed throughout the last um 10 years or 12 years, so for the the first six years of my comedy career, I was footloose and fancy-free. So I could and it worked in well because uh obviously the farm had sucked our cows back then as well, but it was just me and mum on the farm. So my dad he passed away in uh 20 uh 14, but I was able to just um please myself in terms of going to gigs all over Scotland, you know, and to you had to do that to get it was like doing an apprenticeship, you know. So you know, you'd be going away at Aberdeen and doing 10 minutes or 50 quid and all the rest of it, uh, and you were happy to do that, and then met Mourag, and then at the same time that's when the sketches came on, and then but off the back of the sketches, we were able to do we've done a couple of tours of Scotland, um, which is quite full on at a time, but that I've I'm maybe not going out every weekend to random gigs all over the place, you know, and we can just channel that say, right, you're doing a tour, say it's 20 dates throughout six months, yeah, yeah, and that's the nights you're away, and um so so it's just about good management. There's that, plus there's also the fact also being in Pershire, we're quite central, so I would just travel home most nights. But the other big thing that we've done is and I I I do regret it to a little bit now the way the bike the beef price is done, but we sold our subtler cows about three years ago, right? Just because it was a few times I was away and it was maybe you know a a cow was calving or or they broke out or something like that, you know. And I just they weren't really making a lot of money for for the hassle. I mean, you know, and um we decided to sell them, but had I known that the price of beef was gonna go the way it was, yeah, we could have well, I would have just got my calvin tightened up and all the rest.
SPEAKER_03:I was gonna say it it that that leads us quite nicely on to farming. Obviously, your rural Persia Um, you're probably better off than the guys that are further north because as you say, you're central, so so actually getting stuff moved is is much easier. How is farming in this area?
SPEAKER_01:Um well it's it's it it's just the same as any of it. Well we're all right, but it's a it's a beautiful. I mean, I I love Pershire, it's it's um we're very very lucky. We've got um there's a mix of everything, you know. You go three miles that way, you're into the the hills, you know, you're in the foothills of the Cairn Gorms, basically. Yep. A mile down the road, you're on the Tey River bed, some of the the best land uh going, so it it's it's a right good mix. Um but uh yeah, just like the say it just all depends on the weather, and it's so extreme now that there's uh like you always think we're moaning. But last year we had the most horrendous spring, it was wet. Folk round here weren't even starting to sow grain till about the the third week in April, which is unheard of. Yep. Uh fast forward this year. Um it's been a drought, hasn't it? It's been a drought, and some of the barley's looking terrible because it was under so much stress. But then folk were able to get their tatties in and they're all looking great and that. So uh I enjoy the farming here because it is a good mix, and uh, we don't we used to grow tatties ourselves, we don't do any more. I kind of miss it a little bit, but it was just the ups and downs of the potato industry we decided just to come out of that. But we rent a field out to a guy, so there's a good mix. There's the berries along with Blurgowrie, you know, there's still a lot of good um uh cattle and sheep guys as well.
SPEAKER_03:But I suppose that's one thing that many people don't uh they always are amazed when they come to visit me, and I say that you come to the northeast of Scotland and it's one of the biggest growers of soft fruit. Well, I think one of the third biggest growers of soft fruit for the UK. Is that right in this area?
SPEAKER_01:I know, but it's it's it's mental. And of course Aberdeen share, well, you get you get the daylight hours. Yes, the longer daylight. I think Aberdeenshire holds the record for the oil sea drape yield or something. Something like that. Because of the you get an hour, a couple hours extra than the the South England, you know.
SPEAKER_03:Absolutely, yeah. You're looking at pictures and people are like it's 11 o'clock and it's dark, it's like, well, it's still bright daylight outside, and we can carry on for another hour and a bit.
SPEAKER_01:Aye, absolutely. The thing the thing I've always admired about Aberdeenshire in in the the north I've got a cousin that farms at uh Fokabers, um I know that's Murrayshire, but it's I and I I that was he I would go up and spend my summer uh two weeks the holidays up there because there was four four lads uh and we were just all tractor daft, you know. And they they would be combining early early August, yeah. You know, and it my I was so envious of my cousin because they would have they would have like a week longer in the holidays as well in the summer because I think they only got maybe a week in the the tatty holidays in October, so they're so they'd be harvesting ten days earlier and have a week extra. So my cousin basically got to help with the harvest, yeah. I was so jealous of that, you know. But Aberdeenshire, that whole northeast there's just such a farming vibe, yes I and I know you think Persia's still got that, but Persia's more kind of big estates as well, and and I I the town's full current so involved in farming. I think Aberdeenshire, everyone is kind of affect it's saturated.
SPEAKER_03:As you say, that I've come from Turref, and you basically that is the farming village. Yeah, it is everything, and anything is is farming, it's just every kid at the school. The the first thing they want to do is 15, I'm leaving, I'm going to drive the tractor.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you see, and that's great, and and I know turf show and the black aisle get a get a huge support from the the non-farming communities.
SPEAKER_03:Whereas I'm in the personal committee and we're right in the middle of Perth, but it's hard to try and get the I mean we do get support from the town, but you know, for the amount of folk that live in Perth, we should we should be really But I suppose you've you've the Perth's got the downside, it has the motorway, so people still that the the incomers have come up and they get as far as Perth and that's about it, and then the roads all go smaller, A roads and things like that, and they don't want to go further north, so they kind of stop here.
SPEAKER_01:Aye, yeah, there's all that, but I just but the classic one I had a a good friend who was um they had a farm in the Carsagouri and then they they I think they they'd sold up and uh uh and his son at the time, say I don't know they were in primary school, wasn't really that interested in farming. They bought a farm in Keith and uh and uh they got there settled, lovely welcome. You know, the neighbours as soon as they were there, neighbours chatting the door, how you doing, were so and so across the road and all the rest. Um and his son was now going to school in Keith, and there was lads that weren't even in uh from farms, uh talking about tractors and all the rest, you know. It was just it's just a different um it it's it's much more everyone embraces it more.
SPEAKER_03:So the the next sort of point that we were leading to is obviously you've just kind of touched the net uh hit the nail on the head there. Do we see we're from a generation that probably the internet wasn't was just starting, it was just coming on. We've now obviously got a completely new group of people. Do you see there being um uh more youngsters wanting to get into farming, whereas probably from our generation there are more wanting to get out of farming.
SPEAKER_01:Um I don't know, it's a strange one because uh so the the social media side has definitely put farming uh on the map more. Yeah, well, that and along with um like the Clarkson's farm and all that kind of stuff as well, I would say that that's a separate issue than social media. There's now so many folk doing stuff on on social media about farming. The classic example, and he's done really well. Well, the first of his well, if you take it back a bit, grassmen are the first guys to really say and and if somebody told me 15 years ago there's guys and they're just making videos of chopping silage and it's phenomenal, I would have been like, oh no, nobody's gonna watch that.
SPEAKER_03:Exactly. But now they seem to every kid you see wants a grassman hoodie or a cap or a set of overalls.
SPEAKER_01:But you see, it's that it's the children well, it's everyone, but I remember when I was watching Landward, if we got one glimpse of a tractor, I was happy, you know. So I could totally see that. Um so um and and then there's there's the hoof GP, he's done very well as well, because he's he's got that kind of um you know thing of the it's like not shock telly, but it's like Dr. Pimple Popper, there's a cow, yeah, and then he's got all the the gruesome bits, but then it gets all cleaned up and puts a plastic hoof in it, and that's the cow all better, you know, and that that's fantastic. And then but the really Cammy Wilson, I've got to give big credit to he's done he's the the biggest one in Scotland, really he's done really well with the sheep game. And again, if somebody told me there's a guy doing it's just videos of sheep, and but well it's not just videos of sheep, he explains it really well and he's funny with it, but he's done phenomenally well, but he's also very clever and he's done the merch, the whole merch thing, yeah, the sheep game, and and every year he brings out a new design for the Highland Show and all that. So Kami and he he's got his job in Landward, so that can only be a good thing, and I think it is yeah, I I think uh it has probably encouraged more folk who generally wouldn't be interested in farming into farming, uh which is great, but it's as you know, it's that old problem uh land availability and and the price of land. So in one hand the farmers are moaning, oh nobody we can't get staff, but then in the other hand, uh there's folks saying, Well, we want to farm, but we can't get staff. We can't we can't get a lease, we can't get you know, do your own farming, you know, and there is a big difference between uh being your own boss and having your own farm and and having to maybe be a farm manager because I I after we gave up tatties, just me and dad at home there probably wasn't enough work or income for us. So I I got the chance of a manager's job, a farm a serial, I was in charge of the arable crops at an estate about two miles down the road here, and it was a great experience for me. I was late 20s and um it really helped me actually. It was a um a great experience in terms of like management and budgeting and all that kind of stuff. And the the owner, the boss, was a really nice man, I and a great guy, but I just folk thought it was fun spending other folks' money on it. But you've got the responsibility of you know making sure like 800 acres of crops were gonna come in good, yeah. But at the same time, my my heart probably wasn't in it because it wasn't it wasn't yours, you weren't you weren't you weren't you were just making money for somebody else, you know. And I would look over the river and look at my dad's field, and and it was probably a step too far because I'd never had any time to really come back and help dad, you know. So, and so it was a great learning curve for me. But at the end, I I just had to, you know, I says uh thanks but no thanks, and after a year and a half I came back home to to be dad and it with dad, and it actually really made me appreciate what we've got here. We're only 250 acres here, but uh and we're tenants, we don't own the farm, but we're we're tenant farmers, but you know it's all our business. Sheep, cows, the overdraft is all ours, you know. I was gonna say the ugly picture, the overdraft. I I wouldn't I wouldn't swap that for the world now. I and I know I'm very fortunate, very fortunate to that we're secure tenures here, and you know, that's like teeth.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I was gonna say that's another thing that many leases don't have, and I've got friends that have the family that that lease dies with the the lot his father and he can't take it on, and that's the end of the farm.
SPEAKER_01:Plus, now the these leases aren't available, you're only getting a uh a 10 or 15 year lease, and the other thing as well is that um uh if the estate would either like round here's lots of estates, so when the the the old farmer comes out of Tennessee and gives that up, or there's nobody coming on, the estate don't re-release that, that they they'll take it back in their own hands, or they'll you know, they'll they'll lease it out to a guy that's already got you know a thousand fifteen hundred acres that they know that they'll come in, and and I you can't blame them. They can they'll they'll come in, they'll handle it well, they'll pay their rent in time, there's no hassle.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, yeah. You know, but it they it breaks up that small farm. You lose you lose that it's another group of people that are part of it. It's the same. I think this this ties not just with the farms, it ties with the keepering and everything. You you end up losing the community because all of a sudden that house, that farmhouse, well, we might not do anything with it, or we'll just rent it out to somebody, and the people that come in potentially aren't gonna be part of the they're gonna moan about somebody combining or I know, I know, and you're up against it, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:I think I think a great um reflection on that is uh is young farmer club membership over the last 50-60 years, so and you know mum and dad's time, there was maybe eight clubs in Pershia, there was say you know Plurgowy Club was strong, it would maybe have like 80 members, you know, there was clubs in Ayrshire, we'd have like 150 members, all that kind of stuff, you know. I think the National Association at at that time we'd have maybe 60 uh you know, say 60 or 50,000 members. By the time I got to be chairman, I think we were around about three and a half thousand members nationwide. You know, there's only four four clubs in Persia now, you know. And although they're the members are really active and doing really well, but that's just a reflection on the shrinkage in the school. There used to be 60 pupils at the local primary school. Now there's in fact at one point it was down to about 20, but it's went back up. I think there's gonna be 40 this year, which is great. But um, you know, it's just aye. It it's a reflection on on the rural yeah, the rural community is just not there. Plus folk don't you know breed as much here at the end of the day. You know, we were you know, there's families of five and six were quite common by the before the internet and dark nights were else to do.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, yeah. The Outdoor Gibbon Podcast is proudly sponsored by the Shooting and Hunting Academy. Through the Academy, shooters, hunters, and those involved in the use of firearms can gain an in-depth and unique level of training that enables them to shoot better, behave more effectively in the field, up their strike rates, as well as learning new skills. Crucially, those new to deer stalking, the Academy also offers the Proficient Deer Stalker Certificate Level 1, the PDS 1, a deer management certificate that is nationally recognised and accredited both by Lantra and UK rural skills. Visit the Shooting and Hunting Academy to find out more. Let's get back to the show. That uh that we'll we'll we'll divert from that question. So we're we're obviously you said 250 acres, and you're a mixed farm, you're you're growing some arable crops, you're doing some sheep, is it really? Ah, yeah. One of the things that my worst nightmare because sheep just want to seem to be one of those things that always wants to die.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, I yeah, the that is their ambition in life. But uh the thing with sheep, um it is that they're quite simple to look after, you know.
SPEAKER_03:And is that you're just rearing those bringing those on for meat, or are you just bringing those on for lamb or yeah, we try and fatten all our.
SPEAKER_01:So um we'll everything goes fat through the ring at sterling at the market. But if we're a bit tight for fodder, I will sell some store. But we like to we'll keep her on you, hogs back for replacements and and fat and like to try and get as many fat, especially off the grass if we can. But uh yeah, it's just a the thing the nice thing about sheep is that you can buy a ew and uh in October put her to the ram and even by next July you've got a lamb to sell off her, and it's a great way whereas cows um well if we if we heart back to young folk trying to get started in farming, the way the price beef has went, uh it's great for the guys that are in it, but you know, if I think a heifer and a calf at foot now, you're talking about probably four, four and a half grand. Yeah, there's a long time before you get the money back on it.
SPEAKER_03:Ah, and that's the thing, and you see a lot of there's a lot of people doing sheep because there's a lot of the hillside to rent and you can get out there and be a little shepherd and throw stuff on it.
SPEAKER_01:Well that that's the other thing um that's the other thing I noticed as well, um, because we just had a holiday up in Kenlock Berve last week, which was absolutely stunning. But um, you know, from from Inverness all the way up there, it was a tour journey. I hardly saw one sheep on the side of the road on a hill.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_01:You know, and even years ago when we used to go up to my cousins up at Elgin, you know, up the A9 between Dunkell and Avey Moore, up these hills in the kit you always saw sheep, but now you hardly you hardly see a sheep.
SPEAKER_03:I I just think that all uh goes back to other things. Obviously, the big problem at the moment is there's a lot of estates that are just deer fencing the whole place, and once they've deer fenced, they want nothing in there, so there's no grazing, the sheep are away, they want the deer out, and I think that's Scotland has changed dramatically. You've just said you've not seen sheep, and I think the whole thing is there's a lot of a lot of big estates being bought up, unfortunately, and losing everything.
SPEAKER_01:Well, los losing the traditions. I mean, the reason they were so good was because there's 200 years of history there where folk have learned to tame for winter but the hills, you know, and it's stuff like you know, because uh is the moor burning banned now as well in Matter.
SPEAKER_03:It's still going through, it's it's still in it may well by the time this releases, it may well be completely out of the way.
SPEAKER_01:Because folk don't understand it, that stops the you know the the fires, does it?
SPEAKER_03:I mean it stops the fires, it's new, it gives new shoots for for a lot of wildlife and the grouse to move into. You've also got the sheep are out on the hill gathering up the tick.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, well, that's the other thing, the tick mops, plus they're also eating the excess vegetation, yeah. Um, yeah, I know it's a it's it's a real shame.
SPEAKER_03:I think you touched there on uh earlier when we talked about Clarkson's farm and stuff like that, and it's a real shame because he's done fantastic for the farming community and put the farming on the map. Um but I think the big thing is it would be really nice. Maybe it's your goal, maybe that's that's your next challenge, is to actually bring more of a a Scottish farming show to the to the press.
SPEAKER_01:I well, yeah, I that would be um that would be quite good right enough. But I think um well first of all Clarkson's farm has done very well, really well, and um uh I think he said it himself. He he says, well, the look when they looked at it or when um the the farm and tell her used to be um you know John Craven uh uh or Kate Humboldt Holding Alarm and he said well they were very good, they did you know Country File is a really good programme and it's been going a long time and Landward I've got to say is is i it it's a really good show and I always watch it but Clarkson's Farm, especially for me now when I mix with comics and folk for the cities, I meet a lot of non non-farming folk now, uh and they'll say, Oh, did you watch Clarkson Farm? You'll love we'll love Clarkson's Farm.
SPEAKER_03:They can they can relate to it, can't they? Because he's that kind of you either love him or hate him, he's like farm white, and and he's got in there and he's just said, Well, this is what it's all about, right?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, but one woman said to me, She's well, I'm not a fan of him, but I like the show, right? And but also you know, Caleb, yeah, yeah, Caleb has been awesome in that and and Gerald and them all. Um it's not but it I think it's the fact that maybe when it was top gear, Jeremy, you know, he was trying, you know, he's a smooth kind of guy, but I think it's the fact that you see him getting so much stuff wrong.
SPEAKER_03:He's awkward, he's not yeah, yeah, he doesn't do it.
SPEAKER_01:He's out of the comfort zone, yeah, yeah. And I think that's the appeal.
SPEAKER_03:But you can you could do a fantastic one up here, you could have a bunch of like abaddonian farmers and nobody done like having a load of Geralds.
SPEAKER_01:Well, maybe well we did uh uh we did I did have a pilot episode called The Farm with me and um a guy Chris Forbes who was in Scott Squad and we we filmed it here, but it was more situation comedy, and um the BBC were right behind us, but it it just didn't get uh it wasn't as um it just didn't suit well a lot of folk, you know. And then I think Clarkson's Farm came along and it I said well that's the show we're trying to make, and that that's probably natural. I mean farm and life's really good actually, it it has done well, and it it does show the nuts and bolts and the the the dead calves and the the hard it doesn't shy away from that.
SPEAKER_03:I think that's important. I think I think society has been we've we've taken children and we've wrapped them up and now they don't know where things come from, they don't know that the lamb in the field's gonna be lamb chops, that cow over there is your beef burger, a pig's a sausage, yeah. And I think that's something that maybe Clarkson is starting to bring back saying we're raising cows, and and I think that's that's really good.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. But um I think um you know these open farm Sundays not now that they're really popular, but is that uh and we talked about before this, um there's that um that balance it's nice to see maybe dairy cows getting milked, that's nice to see, and then the next door's ice cream shop, yes, but you know, come out and cuddle the pet lambs, they'll look lovely. Come and see the pet lambs, come on, give give the lambs a cuddle, you know. And yeah, they're trying to say, well, this they'll they'll be hung up in a year's time from now, so aye. Um but it it's kind of like that it's getting that balance.
SPEAKER_03:But I think more and more people, I've seen it certainly within the stalking community that people are now wanting. There's a there's a younger generation coming through that want to know where like provenance of their meat, the stuff they're gonna put on the table. Yeah, um, we've got a massive vegan movement throughout the UK. Is it just a fast? Is it gonna come and go? But there's definitely more people wanting to know where that product comes from, be it the the meat they eat, and more have gone down the route of wanting something that they can harvest themselves. Now, obviously, you can't do that in the farming community because everything, because of all the issues we've had over the years, like scrapeies and scrapes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everything has to go to an abattoir, yeah, and and the the home kill service really doesn't exist anymore. Aye, so I think deer stalking allows them to sort of get some meat on their plate, but it's actually being able to say to people, look, this is the real world, you want to eat it, well, it's got to grow somewhere.
SPEAKER_01:Aye, that's it. I think what's on our side as well is the food mile movement as well, you know. Yeah, yeah. You know, if we can um uh I think more folk have I think more folk do consciously buy, make sure their their meat's Scottish or British anyway, you know.
SPEAKER_03:I I still think we've got the big problem though, is obviously, and we could talk about that's a whole nother topic, but you look at what comes in and it's like New Zealand lamb. It's like, but hang on, we do that much, and where where's everything that we're producing in the UK? Oh, it goes out to to France or something.
SPEAKER_01:Well, that's it. I know I don't know how it all works properly because we they rely on these exports. I mean, but um see last year that the price of lamb it was phenomenal last Easter. I mean, folk getting like£200 for their fat lambs and that it was just and um but uh and the the supermarkets got caught out and I have a meet I have a pal that um was in the beef industry and a very clever guy, really clever. He says the supermarkets are nobody making that mistake next year. And although the trade this year was reasonably good, they made sure that they had you know bought in 20 legs of lamb and all the rest of it, you know. Um it's funny. Somebody said to me if they could make a lamb that had eight legs, because it it's the leg of lamb that they want.
SPEAKER_03:It's like a lamb that people want, isn't it? They don't all the rest of it, the trend, what do you do with it?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah. So it it it's funny all that kind of stuff, but and and even though they'd be making a loss selling these because they didn't the way the pr the the lamb job the price went, they they weren't selling them for as dear as that. But um it was like well once we get the customer in to buy his leg a lamb, he also buys the tatties, yes, he also buys the gravy, he also buys the all the and it is nice to see that there are supermarkets in Scotland where you look and the bag says on them this is like Scottish tattties, yeah, and the character from here, and that and that's really good.
SPEAKER_03:It just goes to show that that stuff isn't actually having to do hundreds and hundreds of miles before it turns up on your plate.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
SPEAKER_03:So moving on from that, we were talking about price fluctuations, or that leads us kind of into that sort of that bit of a a topic that many people don't really want to get into, and I think it's one that we should really touch on, which is the sort of the darker side of farming. It's a lonely job. And and daily you hear of situations going on and and it all gets too much. Yeah. How do we sort of what what are people's roots and that what what how what's the best way to to help people out in if they've they're feeling that way in farming?
SPEAKER_01:Well, just um I'm lucky enough to be a I work a lot with RSABI, right the the Benevolent Trust charity who do a lot about mental health now, and um so and they've got their keep talking campaign. Yep. Uh it's it's just like getting folk to try and open up or have a blather, you know, and trying to just um try and open up a bit more and and but or just the having a conversation with someone uh uh you know when they can. And there's also um Farm Strong are now a charity that they've come on, it's an idea from New Zealand, so that's great. And then even like the young farmers did their Are You Okay campaign, yep. And it's only the last 10 years mental health's been really brought to the table in farming.
SPEAKER_03:I think yeah, I think most people, m middle-aged men, uh, are very good at saying, Are you alright? Everything's fine. Uh yeah. You never you never sit down. If you've got the your wife, she'll go and have a chat with her mates. Well, that's it.
SPEAKER_01:You have a heart, a heart, and then a good try.
SPEAKER_03:And then whereas the guys, we just kind of you've got you've always been taught to be stiff up a lip, kind of get on with it kind of thing.
SPEAKER_01:Especially in farming, it's such a proud thing. Yeah, it's it's definitely uh it's such a proud, you know, and what you do is it's your shop window. So if you're a good farmer, folk know you and all the rest of it, and there is that kind of keeping up the appearances thing, but I I certainly don't know, especially my farmers generation, it was certainly you know, in 1985 and that was a terrible year, and then there was some pretty bad tattoos as well. It was some great years too, but you know erm you know, if you're if the things are a bit tough, uh they certainly wouldn't have you know had a beer at the the pub, you know, and had a kind of heart to say, oh well, you know, things are a bit tighter now, you know, the rest of it you know, it was never any of that. And um the thing with farming is that it takes see if you have a bad crop or a poor crop of lambs or the price is crap. Well the price the price you you can't control that, you can't control the weather, but it takes such a long time, you're gonna have to wait another 12 months to to you know try and fix it and all the rest of it. It's it's not like something like stocks and shares or something or or manufacturing when you say, right, we're gonna change the way we're making this today, but next week we'll be you know, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:We're back we're back in the black again and we're moving. Obviously, yeah. I I think we Clarkson literally touched it, showed that beautifully, didn't he? And I think his comment was, I'm glad I don't rely on farming as my income. I know, because that just goes to show that anybody out there that they look at all the stuff that goes up on the social media, somebody driving around in a 200,000 pound tractor, and they're like, Oh, they must be doing well. It's like, yeah, but you don't realise that yeah, they don't own it.
SPEAKER_01:I know, I know. Um, yeah, because it that's the thing, it's like the you keep going their scale back, so these guys have really gone for it, and uh yeah, the cost of machinery is is staggering. But but but coming back to the um the keep the the talking thing and the you see it's a it's a funny thing because I know a lot of guys who are perfectly happy working on their own every day. Yeah, yeah. And if you speak to a traveller or that, a salesman, they don't want to bother guys when they're busy. You know what I mean? I know guys that are quite happy. I'm I'm quite happy working on my own. Especially I've got two kids and a fiance now. So if they're out of the house, I can get away in their tractor, I've got my Spotify, uh everything uh everything's uh I'm quite happy. But having said that, that's because uh I've got a second income now in my comedy, yes, and the pressure, the financial pressure is although the farm has to make money, uh it doesn't always, but it it you know um if we can get it to wipe its face and leave a bit of profit for the work that's involved, I I I can really enjoy it, you know. And I think that's the thing, uh, farmers love their job, you know, and and what I'm trying to say is you know when I said I was working for uh over at the estate there, yeah, and it was good, but I just never felt really that happy uh because my my heart wasn't in it. Um but we we're so rich in other ways we we we can be our own boss, we can I can come in and have a coffee when I want, I can I can take a day off, go to the market if I want, I can uh you know I I sometimes think we should go and get a spend a morning doing some mundane job in a town queuing in traffic for two hours doing some crap job that working with horrible people just to make us appreciate what we have. Having said that, I do know if you you know, especially with livestock, say milk milk. I always thought dairy was a great example, uh it's great when it's going good, but if you're milking cows knowing that you're losing money, you can't just say, Actually, today I'm gonna have a lie in. Animal welfare, um, um, we're gonna go away for the day. Come on, sod it, let's go to the beach. Um, or we'll just stop milking cows for a week, we'll start selling the milk. But you you can't, you have to keep going, you have to keep going.
SPEAKER_03:You know, so um I think farming and gamekeeping are one of those things, it's it's not just a nine to five. You can't come in at five o'clock and go, I'll just turn the farm off, I'll press the button, and that's it. It's 24 hours a day. Uh calfing, lambing, yeah, the looking out the window, it's been non-stop rain for a week. It's just like I know, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:The absolute you know, the winters here. I I I don't know. Well, I'm certainly a lot happier in the summer. I mean, uh I love like mid-March onwards, I love it. The winters, you know, um uh especially when you still have tatties and we were just dressing tatties, it was quite a I was just quite mundane, you know. But so it's that thing like farmers they love what they do, but they just you you have to make money at it, you know, because you know that's what pays the bills and all the rest of it, you know what I mean. And I don't think they even want to make much money from them themselves. I don't think they're fussed for that, but you when you've got folk on your back, the brown letters are coming in, yeah, folk are hounding you for to pay bills, that's not nice. I think that's what gets folk down.
SPEAKER_03:I don't think nobody's wanting to make a fortune and it's keeping a farm for the fortune, it's being able to live and and have a life, knowing that the next generation potentially are gonna enjoy taking that on. Yeah, and I think that's that's something that's come up in the press, obviously. The the way that the farm inheritance tax and all the rest of it has has probably turned what was actually starting to make a turn, and people were starting to enjoy it suddenly gone crazy because you can see it, the protests and people up and down the country really worried about this.
SPEAKER_01:Well, absolutely. Um yeah, it it that has it really has um there are folk really worried, folk have worked very hard and and as I say, they are trying to encourage the next generation in. And now they're saying, Well, it's gonna that's gonna cost you if you you know what I mean, and we're gonna have and folk don't understand you just can't sell off a field, you know, so say to pay the tax or whatever. That's it. It's alright if you've only got a a spare bungalow or something on the on the farm, but you just can't say, Well, we're selling that bit because it you know it's you need all that, it's it's that hard. It's a whole package, you know. And um and and as you say, like the 200 horsepower track, it's not just saying you've got a farm worth um 1.5 million or 2 million, you you've probably got half a million pounds worth of kit there as well, yeah. Yeah, but it's trying to get that message over and trying to get the the public behind us, which can be quite hard at times, and you know, um I think there's a celebrity, I can't remember who it was, tweeted, well, you know, I wish I had a 1.5 million farm to to worry about. And you can kind of see the point of view, but it's about educating the public saying, Well, it's actually not as simple as that, you know.
SPEAKER_03:And I think that's where that's where they they don't see it. It's I think that's where social media has its negative side to it because nobody posts anything about the I'm having a really bad day on here. Well, if you do, then you don't get the many likes. But everybody posts about look at this, look at that, and it's the dopamine. So people look in and they look at the farmer and they look at the young person that's doing TikToks, and it's all great, and everything's living the dream, yeah, yeah, yeah. But behind that side of it is like that five minute or that 30-second clip. There's a whole load of stuff that you haven't seen.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely, absolutely. The only thing I would say about the the protests is you know, buy an old car, go into London and a 30-year-old datson, don't go in a rain robby, don't go in a 24-plate rain robot. Yeah, exactly, because it doesn't look you know, but I'm all for the you know, and you that's the only way we can get folk to listen, but um you know it's uh yeah, it's a hard one, not so.
SPEAKER_03:I think we'll uh we'll we'll come away from that, and if anybody's got any questions, there'll be links and they can go and have a chat, and and it's the same in the gamekeeping world, it's um it's uh sort of lookout for a mate. Let's move on to a lighter note. Obviously, I think you've got a tour you're planning to take potentially down into England.
SPEAKER_01:Yes. Uh yes, so I've got um I'm just looking into it just now. I I'd because I've had two tours of Scotland, and uh I think everyone up here's heard all my old stuff. It's like, well, before I write well, I'm trying to write a new show for Scotland for next year. Uh I thought, well, I've got all this material, and and but just with having the kids, um you know, two kids in in two years, uh it's been pretty full on, but now they're a bit older and uh I don't feel so guilty about leaving Moorag with them. Um I think now's my time to dip my toe south of the border. I I've done the Newcastle stand, uh, but I've just erm and uh which was good fun, but I've I'm actually doing I've got two nights in Carlisle, um which is literally just dipping my toe in the water, isn't it? What is it, 12 miles over the border? Dipping my toe and it's sold out pretty well, so I've got that coming up in um in early July. I'm really looking forward to it actually. Um but I haven't anything else set in stone yet, but I put a thing out in Facebook England, Wales, Ireland, let us know where whether it's good because there's no point me trying to do inner city comedy clubs. I'd far rather go to lovely market towns and that do the town hall. Um so luckily folk came up with lots of advice. So I'm just trying to get all on a map and just see where we want to.
SPEAKER_03:Well you've got to go back to Northern Ireland, haven't you, to find the uh the NFU pin.
SPEAKER_01:Oh the back the young farmer's badge, yes. I I better get that back. Yeah, I've not been like to let that down. But um, yeah, so because uh I'm a bit dubious yet excited about it. Folk are folk say I'll understand what you're saying and all the rest of it, but as long as I just slow down, I do tend to take speak quite fast, but is but the thing with farming, it's it's universal, the jokes are universal.
SPEAKER_03:It doesn't matter what you talk about, whether you're talking about Yows or Yews.
SPEAKER_01:That's it. I know. See, the classic one was I don't know if you ever read his books, but Henry Henry Bruis, who was a farmer, I th I want to say Yorkshire or Northumberland. I'm sorry if I've got this wrong, but he he did sketches back in the 80s and he brought a book out called Funny Way to Make a Living, and it was all little sketches of um she this sep they call them this this peasant farmer, and it and it was all about you know fighting the the tax man and the bank and uh the department and the yows dying and all the rest of it, and um it it's still irrelevant today, but it was it didn't matter, everyone got it, yes. You know what I mean? Yeah, everyone got it, and the the classic one he's got a sketch, there's a yow dead in her back, and um the sun's going to this dad. Ah, look at that the first sign of spring. Fantastic. So yeah, so I'm I'm just busy trying to plan that an house, so um I think it'd be good for the for the winter because I think England especially we our weather's been not too bad, but I think last year they were pretty rough, David. Some pretty roughly roughly.
SPEAKER_03:I think that's why our bali prices were better than theirs.
SPEAKER_01:Aye, yeah. So uh yeah, England, Wales, Ireland I'm coming for you, so and there's surely enough expats to turn out and do a turnadoric, surely.
SPEAKER_03:Aye, you'll be fine down there. And if not, you can just have a translator on the stage.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03:So I think that's uh I've taken up enough of your time as you're a busy guy, but uh, this has been Jim Smith, so thank you very much.
SPEAKER_01:Well, it's been a pleasure. Always enjoy uh getting an excuse to sit in the house and have a coffee and just crack away with Ferman.
SPEAKER_03:Fantastic, thank you. I hope you enjoyed that podcast. It certainly was a pleasure to make it to meet somebody you've seen on the internet who brings joy and happiness to a dull day, and then actually to get to sit there, enjoy a coffee with him, have a bleather, and uh and bring you something that you can listen to. If you don't follow him, go and find him on the internet and have a look. He is certainly very much worthwhile having a look at some of the sketches and the comedy he does. Absolutely have you in stitches. I remember while we were actually having the coffee, Jim has now one of the outdoor given podcast mugs, which then leads me on to the nice point of the outdoor gibbon podcast merch. Don't forget we've got those hoodies, beanies, t-shirts, mugs, stickers. They're all available. If you want anything, we hopefully will get a website up at some point, but just drop us an either an email, uh, a DM, either on Facebook or Instagram, and we will give you the way to get hold of that and send you something out. And on that note, thanks for listening, and we'll catch you on the next one.