Innovation, diversification, sustainability & environment is our ethos here at Hallrule. We have created a number of small business ventures and aim to offer natural and healthy food to our community through Rule Water Venison, farm at one with nature, to share the beauty of countryside living and promoting all the wonderful things the borders have to offer through our newest venture, Tiny Home Borders. www.tinyhomeborders.co.uk www.rulewatervenison.co.uk
The farm diversified into deer farming in 2017 which leads nicely into our first lockdown project of 2020 which was the setting up of our new online venison enterprise, lead by the youngest member in our family run business. We started off with selling Vension which are born and reared in the borders, and due to gaining popularity and demand for being able to trace the food back to source, have expanded into Lamb and Beef as well.
The next challenge was taking an 18 foot bale trailer and transforming it into a luxurious and eco-friendly holiday accommodation. Tiny Home Borders was born, fully run on solar power, and nestled in amongst fields of red deer. The tiny home opened in March 2022, and has been a wonderful and fulfilling challenge to complete. Tiny Home Borders, sells Rule Water Vension to our visitors who come from far and wide, and has helped our guests understand the concept, and the merit of ‘field to fork’. A large part of the appeal and the success of our tiny home is that it takes every opportunity to leverage so much that the borders have to offer. Supporting local business by supplying their produce from local chocolate, cake, and gin sellers, along with promoting walks with Rule Water Alpacas
With the farm situated on the southern slopes Ruberslaw, a site of special scientific interest, we consider it an honour to act as a custodian of such a beautiful corner of the world, and it is a role that we approach with respect to the sustainability of nature through good environmental practices. These efforts have been acknowledged in the past with Hallrule farm winning conservation awards through the border crop and grassland society. As much work as we put into the farming the land, we put into ensuring that we are working towards an increasingly more sustainable farming practice. We have planted 12 kilometres of hedges to create a corridor for birds to travel. Five hectares have been turned into hardwood plantations, ponds, grass margins and mosaic habitats have been created and cared for. The birdsong and the now species rich grassland has been a reward in itself.