Dexters in the limelight - on TV

Duncan MacIntyre · Post by **Duncan MacIntyre** » Sat Nov 07, 2009 12:31 pm

Congratulatins to Penny, no need to worry it was very good and the cattle looked well.

I was away Tues till Thursday so recoded the programme and watched last night. I thought it was excellent publicity for Dexters and assume it is an on going thing which is very good.

I did however think that the so-called kick was a mere tickle, if I had been inspecting the cow (4 legged) I would have assumed that she was just lifting her leg to allow me access to the udder. In the past I have witnessed with great amusement as a dairy farmer thrust a hand under a dexter after announcing that she looked as if she would have a bit of milk. He was hit 3 times with both back feet before they touched the ground. THAT was a kick. I hasten to add that she has no descendants in my current herd.

Duncan

Penny · Post by **Penny** » Sun Nov 08, 2009 1:14 pm

Janet did have good reason to swear, it was a good kick with an echo around the field as it struck home, it just depends how they edited it. I'll have to look again. Janet tried her udders once and got a warning leg, but was persuaded by the TV crew to give it another shot to get the right clip, but this time Minim met her target!
I hope they do show a bit more of the first bits of filming, choosing the cattle, because the herd was looking good and it was not possible to see much at all of the steers.

Penny · Post by **Penny** » Sun Nov 08, 2009 1:16 pm

Forgot to say, have been thinking about selling "signed" autographs of the cow which kicked Janet, with a muddy foot print, on ebay...............! She certainly is a popular cow.

Broomcroft · Post by **Broomcroft** » Tue Nov 10, 2009 7:58 pm

Good luck tonight Penny. Got the recorder set, 9 p.m. Channel 4.

Broomcroft · Post by **Broomcroft** » Wed Nov 11, 2009 9:18 am

That was brilliant Penny. Your Dexters were only on a few seconds but Janet Street Porter has been given the task of gathering together the best pork animals, best beef and presumably other livestock as the program processes. It's like a Noah's Ark of the best meats available being collected and millions of people will be watching it every week. Absolutely brilliant for all the breeds concerned. Though I do wish someone would nail Gordon Ramsey's feet to the ground to stop him bobbing up and down, it makes your eyes go funny!

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bjreroberts · Post by **bjreroberts** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 3:45 pm

Well done Penny, it is great to see Dexters on TV.

I see we can also add David Dimbleby to the list of celebrity keepers of Dexters http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol....952.ece although not quite the type of publicity we want!

Woodmagic · Post by **Woodmagic** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 4:59 pm

Certainly not good publicity, I sincerely hope it is something can be soon forgotten. I know nothing of the circumstances in this case, but over the years have seen many instances where impatience caused problems. The procedure inevitably is prolonged when folks are impatient. Just waiting and leaving the cattle to make the first move will usually give the desired result. Once the animal(s) is harried it is likely to be a long fraught struggle, a bribe of food can assist. Dexters always sense your mood and being in a hurry is hopeless. I have had a wise stockman arrive and load in short shrift single handed and have watched three or four spend a bad tempered unsuccessful twenty minutes. The recent tendency to eliminate straw doesn’t help since the animal is likely to decide to avoid a slippery surface.

carole · Post by **carole** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 3:01 pm

Couldn't agree with you more Beryl we tried to move some bullocks last saturday just along a stretch of road that they had travelled frequently, we were unfortunately complacent and were swiftly taught a lesson as the next few minutes turned into a Benny Hill sketch with cows all over the place except on the road.
We returned the steers to their original field and came back the next day when they happily trotted down the road and the whole process took less than 10 minutes!
Don't you just just love them!

SteveM · Post by **SteveM** » Sat Nov 14, 2009 2:54 pm

There is a write up on the program in darlington and stockton times, tried putting a link below, or google dexter cattle should find it

http://www.darlingtonandstocktontimes.c ... ...TV_show

Penny · Post by **Penny** » Sun Nov 22, 2009 12:34 pm

UPDATE
I have been told that the Dexters will be on the programme again this tuesday, when they are showing the class at Nidderdale show, so hopefully good promotion.
However, I would really like everyone to appreciate that [U]this was the first show that both myself and my cattle had done,[/U] so to do it with TV cameras and telling Janet what to do was a stressful initiation!
Due to various restrictions with the amount of time that Janet was available, she had not actually walked with the Dexters until being in the ring, so I thought she did incredibly well.
The cows and I had been filming the day before as well, with show preparation, and they had the cattle foot trimmer a few weeks before, but I doubt if any of that will be shown sadly.
I knew it would be edited heavily, but sadly a huge amount is being lost. In the beginning, they wanted Janet to be able to choose from a field the steers which ones she was to take, and also the milkers, and they did not want it set up, but a big choice.
So I had 8 steers all who had to be used to having a weigh band put around them in a field with cameras etc ( as they wanted to film that!)
and 13 girls, all who had to be haltertrained ( plus calves!) suitable for showing, and milking plus also tolerating a tapemeasure held up to the udder to measure the teats, as they wanted to film this too. (Hence the kick!) This was a huge undertaking, as it is not easy to get cows to fulfil all the criteria easily.
So my girl in the show, Churcholme Gingernut, was actually a replacement, as one of the original girls got a cracked teat( not good when away from home). She's a lovely girl, but not show quality, I know. Also she had been mliked and they weren't on the best of land at Nidderdale so her condition was not like how my herd usually is.
I am most sad about the fact that the milking, (which caused me hours of hard work because they initially said they would buy milk in, then suddenly it was to be from my girls) is looking like it will be edited down to virtually nothing, but the icecream maker and the cheesemaker who used my dexter milk will probably get more coverage.
Anyway, I did say I would give some background to it, so now you have my ramblings, and hopefully we will get some good promotion still.
Fingers crossed!

SteveM · Post by **SteveM** » Wed Nov 25, 2009 7:35 am

Nice to see more good coverage of the dexters on last nights progam, and a some familiar faces from the dexter society.

Broomcroft · Post by **Broomcroft** » Fri Nov 27, 2009 6:16 pm

Well done Penny, couldn't watch it the other night, so recorded it and watched it last night. I can't wait for the program when they actually eat some! Pity JSP had to swear in the middle of it, I'm sure she must get paid a bonus for each word.

Anyhow, hopefully we're not going to have to wait a year for a steer to grow up? I can't stand the suspense. I wonder of they're going to serve it and get votes from the diners like they are in the weekly program? That would be scary.

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Penny · Post by **Penny** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 4:01 pm

I am so disappointed about how this is all going. It works out about 1 hour of my work for each second shown on TV! Also they showed the bit when Gingernut was misbehaving without my explanation, which they had promised they would............the poor girl had first had her feet trimmed at my farm that morning, then had a 90 minute trailer drive, then left in the trailer until it was "the right time" to be let out, then just an hour or so to get used to her new surroundings before being caught and taken away from the others to be filmed! They all legged it as soon as they saw the cameras again, so she was in a strange field surrounded by cameras and unable to see her calf. But it just looked as she was misbehaving.
I too, looked the worse for wear ( bad hair day to say the least!!) because I had been in that wet field since the early morning, with no where to sit down and it was mid afternoon before they did the cattle so the sun had gone and drizzle set in. My arthritis was killing me. I could have sworn like Janet!

I don't think there is much positive PR coming from this yet except that people think the Dexters are very pretty and want to see more Dexters and a lot less of Gordon and the restaurant ( these are Foodie customers, not animal owners)
Next week is milking, which I am dreading as Janet did not get it, but it is apparently only very brief .However the beef has already gone to the restaurant, Clive, so you can relax, there should be some good things about that at the end of the series.

I got into this to promote Dexters, but I think just as much publicity has come from Radio 2 as the hours and hours of filming that was done to produce this, so I do feel like I have wasted my whole summer.

Duncan MacIntyre · Post by **Duncan MacIntyre** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 5:30 pm

Penny, do not worry, I have seen each episode so far before I have heard any "behind the scenes" info from you, and for the sort of programme it is I think it is all going not too bad. Of course we could do with more footage shown, and more of the explanations from yourself as to what is happening and why, but do not worry, it is getting the Dexter breed name out to people in a positive way. If they seemed like toys to the general public then that would not be a good thing either.

I did a bit for a TV Vet programme years ago at Stoneleigh, with our North Ronaldsays. Nothing at all compared to the input you have had to give, but it did give me a very sharp insight into the editing powers of a producer. Things blend seemlessly on screen and events do not even follow the sequence which you remember at the time. And it is upsetting to have put in quite a bit of effort for what is cut to litterally a few seconds.

One thing is certain, your efforts are well appreciated by many Dexter breeders.

Thank you.

Duncan

Broomcroft · Post by **Broomcroft** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 5:31 pm

Penny, it's brilliant. Dexters have been chosen to be THE BEST BEEF cattle on their Noah's Ark of the ultimate food, thanks to you. What you have done is fantastic for the breed and the beef. This program has cemented the Dexters place right at the top of the tree. All the detail will be forgotten. When Caroline was in the cookery program, that was probably less than an hour in total but it tooks months, many weekends away in London etc. They condense it down incredibly. But the overall message has come across loud and clear, they keep repeating it to make the point; "They had to choose the best so they chose Dexters". It's just great, it really is.

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