Sam Pierce was busy drawing away top soil from the site of a proposed seven bay slatted shed for his 63-head Hereford Cross suckler herd when we spoke last week. The original herd on the farm at Newtown, Bannow, Co Wexford was around half that number, says Sam (27). “Going back to my grand-uncle’s time, the family have always run a mixed farm enterprise with cattle, sheep and tillage. My father’s uncle William ran a pure-bred suckler Hereford herd alongside a pure-bred sheep enterprise. When my father and mother took over in 1987 they continued the beef enterprise but they dropped the sheep,” he tells me.