Perrystone Estate
Cattle have always been part of our lovely estate, grazing our permanent pasture in the Wye Valley. We have until recently been selling our cattle to Marks & Spencer’s, but wanted to use our grass better and not have to feed corn to produce a supermarket type of product. To utilise the grass we felt we needed to move away from the mass-produced foreign beef breeds and go back to the traditional English breeds. They would thrive on our permanent pasture producing a better quality of meat. This is how we got involved in Ruby Red Devon’s.
Ethically Farmed Cattle
We started off buying a Bull to cross on to our Continental cows and then set about looking for a couple of pure breed Heifers. We were very lucky to find the fantastic Hansnett Herd for sale as a whole, so instead of a couple of young ladies to start us off slowly, we jumped in at the deep end with 10 cows with calves. There was a lot of quality in the herd with bloodlines winning at the Royal Show. The new herd settled in well with our existing cattle and started to show us exactly why they were the perfect cattle to be grazing our varied and beautiful landscape.
They are predominately grass fed and live out as much as possible, only really coming in when they are due to calve or the fields are too wet. They would much rather be out roaming the fields. When they are housed they live off hay and a little bit of silage when they have calved requiring very little concentrated feed.
Rich In Heritage
The Ruby Red Devon are a very old traditional breed originally based in North Devon. They are a slow growing breed, that love to be outside grazing and do particularly well on herb rich permanent grass. There meat is renowned for being fantastically tender due to the slower growth.
Our Devon beef is all home produced, with us only buying in the bulls to keep the bloodlines fresh. Our beef can be traced from birth to your plate. We have a very high health status and are committed to giving our animals the best life we can. They spend their lives roaming our permanent pastures along the beautiful Wye Valley ANOB and live a stress-free idyllic life. We feel this really comes through in the taste of the beef.
WoolCool
Perrystone Meats are delighted to say we will be working with the lovely people at WoolCool to supply the boxes and insulation for our meat boxes.
We chose WoolCool as our preferred packaging supplier as they meet all the criteria that inspired us to set up Perrystone Meats originally. We want to provide sustainable produce with minimal impact on our environment.
Woolcool is a good quality sustainable product that is recyclable and bio-degradable. We provide this great packaging to our customers at no extra cost. So you can have fantastic tasting produce, straight from the farm while looking after our planet.
The boxes are made from high strength corrugated cardboard; the liners are made from 100% sheep’s wool, sealed in 100% recyclable food grade film. The boxes will also contain Sorba Freeze ice packs, these help to keep the box contents below 5C for over 24hrs up to 48hrs. Due to the unique natural qualities of the wool you need fewer ice packs per box than with polystyrene.
The top benefits of using WoolCool as our packaging are:
- Wool is a natural smart fibre that provides a superior and cost effective alternative to polystyrene and Polyethylene, creating a truly eco-friendly packaging.
- Wool is an abundant natural material, as a by-product of rearing sheep.
- Wool is a totally compostable and fully bio-degradable packaging, releasing valuable nitrates back into the soil.
- Wool is also a re-useable material, the packaging can be sent back to be re-used or the wool once removed from the film can be used in a multitude of ways around the home and garden.
- The wool itself is completely chemical free, the only process it goes through is a thorough washing in very hot water.
