After a long and productive career in agriculture David Crozier, 71, has decided to retire.
His working life spans 54 years and he is best known in Scotland for his 18 years as farms manager at Southesk Farms in Angus and latterly for his 12 years with Brechin agricultural technology company Soilessentials.
Mr Crozier was brought up on a family farm near Newcastle and after gaining a National Certificate in agriculture with distinction at Kirkley Hall College he took up his first post at Farmers Weekly’s East Bracklinn Farm at Callander.
At that time the magazine ran farms across the UK using them as test beds for new ideas. David’s tasks there included tractor work and hill re-seeding. East Bracklinn was also to be the first new home for David and his new bride Theo.
After three years he moved back nearer home to Harehope Farms at Wooler as assistant manager.
This 3,000-acre mix of hill, in-bye grazing and arable was to provide a real range of managerial experience.
Mr Crozier recalls the lambing shed rota of 36 hours on and 12 off as being particularly character forming.
His spell in Northumberland was to last nine years before a move to High Mowthorpe, high on the Yorkshire wolds. At that time this noted arable and livestock unit was part of the network of Experimental Husbandry Farms (EHFs) run by national advisory body Adas. As farms manager Mr Crozier had not only to organise the farm work but accommodate a whole range of field scale experimental work.
During the three years he was there he recalls the farm hosting 4,000 visitors every year.
The next move was to be in 1982 and brought David, Theo and their two sons Ali and Graeme north to what was to become their adopted county of Angus.
Southesk Farms’ Oxford-based consultants James Garson and Roger Emmett were looking for a new manager for the 3,500-acre unit and approached Mr Crozier to see if he was interested.
He was and before long he was in charge of a staff of 14 farming combinable crops, potatoes, peas, carrots, soft fruit as well as a bull beef unit and a store lamb finishing enterprise.
His 18 years in charge of this large diverse business was to be an interesting one as it adapted to rapidly changing times in the farming world.
Staff cuts were latterly part and parcel of the changes and in 2000 David himself faced redundancy and a complete change of direction.
After nearly two years of undertaking various short-term contracts he became, much to his pride, the first full-time employee of fledgling agri-technology company Soilessentials.
At this time precision farming was in its infancy and the three farmer directors of the company had been building up expertise in this new discipline.
GPS technology provided the breakthrough and David spent much of his time out in the fields of eastern Scotland taking soil samples on a grid system with a specially adapted quad bike. His task was then to send the samples off for analysis and use the results to prepare maps which could then be used by farmers and contractors for variable application of lime and fertilisers.
“It may only be 12 years since I started here as the first employee but the progress has been amazing,” Mr Crozier said.
“Apart from anything else there are around 25 of us working here now.
“I sort of retired in 2008 but came back straight away on a part-time basis working 15 hours a week in the office preparing maps and application programmes.
“We worked from a room here in the farmhouse at Hilton of Fern and before we moved to the new offices on the farm there were eight of us working in it.
“We never needed to turn the heating on.”
Asked whether he had found it difficult to adapt to computer-based precision farming, Mr Crozier said: “I had no computer skills at all when I started here but I picked them up from Jim (technical director Jim Wilson) and learned as I went along.
“Actually I think people of my generation have seen more changes in farming than any other. I remember going out with my grandfather when he was working with horses. If you wanted to measure land then you used a chain and it stayed that way well into my career.
“GPS changed all that and for the last few years I have been working at the leading edge of technology.
“Looking back it has been quite a journey.”
The Croziers live in Brechin and Mr Crozier plans to spend more time on the local golf course and playing for Brechin Castle Curling Club.