That evening I informed my husband Jimmy who had just returned from London, that I had spoken to a nice man who lived locally and that we were going to see his cattle. When Jimmy asked how local and I replied Cumbria, I could tell by the look on his face that geography was not one of my strong points. Jimmy explained that due to pressure of work he would not be able to  ‘Pop down the road to Cumbria’ approx 280 miles each way. I managed to persuade him to speak with Jim Buchanan on the phone, I could hear that they had a lot in common and I was delighted to be told that four Blonde cattle would be delivered the following week.

  Amongst these animals were two cows, one was Ganaway Finesse and the other was Ganaway Fifi, who was the biggest cow that I had ever seen, these formed the nucleous of our breeding females. We also purchased a six-month-old bull calf Hayton Ike. We subsequently commenced showing Finesse and won a number of breed Championships including our first Interbreed title at Leicester County Show.

  We always felt that Blonde cattle should be big in size and stature as they are in France and as Finesse and Ike were over a ton, we were recommended to try and flush Finesse with Ike. This resulted in Hackleton Loretta and Hackleton Lucky being born to recipient cows. They have both won many County Championships and at the Royal Show Loretta came first in her class in 1998 and 2000. We had even greater success with Lucky who became Supreme Breed Champion in 1999 and again in 2003.

   As an added bonus, the natural calf born to Finesse again by Hayton Ike was Hackleton Mozaic, who was only shown as a young heifer as she was not needed for our adult show team. When the first Blonde Elite female sale was announced, we were asked if we had any well-bred cattle that we could enter to support this event, we decided to enter Mozaic even though she was due to calve a short while before the show. All cattle had to be inspected for correctness and suitability prior to the show and Richard Holloway duly arrived to inspect her.

 During this inspection, Richard wanted to know if Mozaic was quiet to handle and as she had started to calve in the paddock my Son in Law Neil walked up to her and pulled the calf out without Mozaic moving an inch, and asked Is that right Richard? Needless to say, Mozaic passed her inspection.

  At the Carlisle show, she was placed second in her class and as she did not sell, returned home. We decided to keep her and get her show fit for the following year. Good Move as not only was she Champion at a couple of County shows we were delighted when she won her class and went on to become Reserve Blonde Champion at the 2004 Royal Show having only calved three weeks prior. This completed a hat trick of first prizewinners for each of the three sisters at the Royal Show.

  I have to say that I thoroughly enjoy my Blonde cattle and as I mentioned earlier, socialising is part of the whole event. Two amusing incidents that spring to mind are as follows: - Apart from geography not being a strong point, I am not very good at remembering people’s names. One such person was Derek Hicks who showed Barry Harpers cattle, every time I saw him; I called him by a different name – Duncan, Brian, Kevin or Derek. I was in the bar enjoying a victory drink after Lucky won the Royal when Derek entered the bar alone, Jimmy asked me to go to the bar and get Derek, Duncan, Brian a pint of lager, so I duly trotted off to the bar and returned with three pints of lager, needless to say Derek drank all three! Another memorable Royal Show was when a party of French breeders from the Brittany area came over complete with a consignment of Pierre’s magic prune liquor. Picture the scene – A very hot day, everyone very thirsty and plenty of prune juice around. Many people wished they could forget that eventful afternoon, I just wish that I could remember it.

  Finally, the last few years have been traumatic within our Society and I would like to hope that all breeders put all negative thoughts behind them and use all their energies in a positive manner to promote the great cattle that we breed.