Village where everything stops for the geese hosts annual farm walk

One of the few farms whose geese are driven through the village each night to the protection of the farmyard is hosting the annual farm walk of the British Goose Sector Group.

The Botterill family, who have been keeping geese for almost 25 years at Lings View Farm, Croxton Kerrial, near Grantham, will on October 16 be showing other producers from all over the UK and Ireland how they rear, pluck, process and market some 1500 for Christmas.

With some of the pastures at the far end of the village, local residents have long been familiar with the sight of geese returning at dusk to their night quarters. But passing motorists aren"e;t always so patient.

"Just occasionally we come across an irate motorist," says Richard Botterill. "Like the time one motorist got out of his car and started taking pictures of the geese. He said his boss would never believe why he was late for work!"

The Botterills — Gerald and Ann, son Richard and daughter-in-law Jo — sell around one third of the geese at the farmgate, supply many farm shops and butchers through the East Midlands and have some customers country wide. They also produce other free range poultry — turkeys for Christmas and chickens through the year — as well as growing wheat, oilseed rape and beans on the arable acres.