About The Kent Family
Polventon Farm is a 480 acre tenanted dairy and beef farm situated on sloping ground overlooking the Fowey River near St Neot. The farm has been in the family for four generations, and brothers, Graham and Andrew, together with Andrew’s son Jack, are continuing the family line. The dairy enterprise consists of 170 milking cows that produce 1,000,000 litres of milk a year, they also keep some calves for their beef enterprise, as well as growing a small amount of barley to feed the cattle.
Why they like to work at Trewithen
The Kents joined Trewithen three years ago and are six miles away from the dairy. They enjoy working with Trewithen as they respect their producers, and have a co-operative feel with how all the farming families work together. They like that the ‘TREW’ standards have an emphasis on cow welfare, as having ‘happy cows’ is a core principle of theirs.
Main Cow Breed
After 20 years of crossbreeding with Friesian, Norwegian Red, Montbeliarde, Ayrshire and other European breeds, they have created their own hybrid ‘Cornish Red’. Their aim is to breed a robust and healthy cow that can graze Cornish pastures and happily remain outdoors for the maximum amount of time.
Favourite Cow
They have many friendly cows, but one particular favourite picked out by Andrew’s daughter Laura, is ‘Big Bertha’, as she was born on her wedding day.
Their regen journey so far
The family have always been passionate about farming in partnership with the environment, and has adopted several regenerative agriculture principles. As regenerative agriculture has carbon reduction at its core, the Kents appreciate how Trewithen is set to challenge misconceptions that cows are bad for carbon emissions.
They enjoy the challenge of adopting new techniques linked to the regenerative principles of improving soil health, including planting multi-species herbal leys, which bring benefits to soil structure, the environment, as well as cow health. They also manage their grass to allocate fresh paddocks to the dairy cows twice a day, allowing the herd to rotationally graze and giving the pasture time to recover.