The Powells have been farming in mid-Wales for over 50 years. Alongside their hens, they also raise sheep and beef, with a flock of Beulah Speckled sheep and calves that are reared to forward stores. Let’s dive in and learn more about their incredible work...

We are a family-run farm with myself (Tristan) taking on the running of the poultry unit alongside my wife Joann and our two sons; Adam and Baydn. When not farming our son Adam is an engineer and Baydn, is doing carpentry at college but both plan to come home and farm in the future.

We diversified into poultry in 2009 starting out with a 12,000-bird unit, which has since developed into a 32,000-bird unit! Our current flock are Lohmann Classics, we have virtually always gone for this breed as we have found they work well with our shed and management system. They perform well with minimum seconds, low mortality and continuous high egg production right to the end. The birds are currently 51 weeks and laying at 94%. We sourced our pullets from Wynnstay Humphrey Feed & Pullets as we have a long-term fantastic relationship with Richard Jones there and have been happy with the quality of the pullets we receive. We also source our feed through them and have a good relationship and support from our feed rep James.

We have a Big Dutchman 264 system in our shed. The unit is run by solar panels and wind turbines with import and export being equal. Manure produced by the girls is used on our own grassland which we use for crops and grazing. We have just finished building a poultry-specific muck store which will be able to hold 6 months' worth of manure.

We chose to join St. Ewe Free Range Eggs as we liked that they were a smaller family-run business and with Bex being a farmer herself, we felt they had a real understanding of farming and how it is truly a 24/7 operation. Because of this, we know Bex and the team are always on hand. We decided to work with St. Ewe, not just because of the eggs, but because they have a strong brand, and we could foresee the growth opportunity, and we were excited to grow together. This works well for us being a family farm and we like working together for the long term. Although the St. Ewe packing centre is based a long way away from us, with 2 poultry team members living locally we know we always have advice and support not far away. One of our favourite things is when you call the office, no matter who it is they always ask “How can we help you?” and this makes us always feel at ease and we know the team will help with anything.

We are always trying to improve and expand our business, our current project is building a slatted shed, which will house 200 head of cattle.