Zoe Colville, also known as The Chief Shepherdess, is on a successful one-woman mission to show that #FarmingCAN.
Liam Mooney reports.
In the past five years, Zoe Colville has gone from accomplished hairdresser to shepherdess, social media influencer and now published author, with her new book The Chief Shepherdess: Lessons in Life, Love and Farming available for pre-sale now.
Zoe had an unorthodox start to her new career in agriculture, giving up a successful hairdressing career in London and slowly becoming a fully-fledged shepherdess running her own flock of sheep.
Zoes partner Chris tempted her into the farming lifestyle after the sudden loss of her
father.
Initially, she moved to Kent to help with the farm on the side of hairdressing.
She says: We rent all of our land so it would have been too much of a gamble for both of us to work and make a living off the farm, but now with our farm fridge business generating another income and selling our meat directly to the customer, I am all in.
Zoe and Chris currently run up to 500 ewes and fatten up to 400 lambs and ewes per year.
The couple started off by buying the cheapest cull ewes at the market on the day, breeding them for one year and fattening the ewes and lambs up for the butcher because that was all they could afford to do.
However, they now breed their own replacements and the flock is growing slowly. Zoe says: We do not just have one breed on the farm, we have lots, from Texel mules to Soays and Swaledales.
We just bought anything we could afford. However, now we are growing and keeping lambs back as replacements and hope it goes well.
With no background in farming or formal agricultural education, Zoe says she learned through conversation and
through Chris relentlessly quizzing her on different breeds and health signs of stock.
Community
She says getting to know the local farming community and jumping head first into conversation at the marts also propelled her knowledge-gathering and she now passes that information on through her online presence.
Since starting to drive her Instagram account during the Covid-19 lockdowns, she has amassed almost 40,000 followers. However, it has not all been plain sailing. She thought that with her hairdressing background she would be a natural sheep shearer, but soon found that was far from the case.
She says: I help with the wrapping of the wool, but that is it. It is like a dance with the sheep and I am not good at that.
But her farming credentials are going from strength to strength. She says: Mistakes have been made and we have had to learn quickly. Last year we lost 40 sheep to haemonchus. We were not doing enough faecal egg counts regularly and consistently enough. Now we are and that mistake will not happen again.
Being happy to share the ups and downs of her new life is something Zoe is passionate about. Educating the public about what actually happens on-farm is always at the forefront of her approach to social media, correcting any misconceptions or stereotypes about life on the farm.
Now she is also passing on some of her experience through the release of her new book.
Asked what she hopes people will take away from the book, she says: I want people to understand that farmers are very courteous.
They deal with life and death on a regular basis and you never get used to that. If the farmers do not look after their animals, their animals will not look after them by producing the best grade for the shelves. It is a
two-way street and we care.
Social media
If you follow Zoe on social media, you will also see that she loves her boots, but not just any boots Muck Boots.
So much so that the brand has now recruited her as a brand ambassador. When asked why Muck Boots? she says: Because they work. I used to always get chilblains, but not any more. A few clothing companies reached out to me to promote their products, but Muck Boots were the only ones I was already using, so it was a no-brainer."
I have three pairs: the Apex for summer; the Arctic Ankle which are easy for driving; and the Arctic Tall to stay nice and warm on those frosty days.
To have achieved so much in such a short space of time, it seems Zoe definitely made the right decision to hang up her hairdressing scissors.
