William and Claire Lambert, Raygill Farm, Hawes.
Lost 97 cattle and 160 sheep.

(William)
"Right at the beginning, before we even got it, I rang up the local council and asked if it would be possible to construct baths across the roads to disinfect the vehicles. And they told me I was pretty stupid. Then, within two days of us being the first farm in the area to test positive, they'd put two disinfectant baths across the road, 2 miles either side of our farm! I'd been organising what precautions farmers in the area should take, so it was a huge shock, not just to us but to everybody, that we were doing everything to protect ourselves and then we were the first to get it. It still doesn't make sense. It started with one particular cow. At milking time her teats were very sore and blistered. I was very concerned. I came in and had breakfast, then looked at the cow again, and she was obviously distressed. I have a book on ailments in dairy cows, so I flicked through the pages and found a virus which looked like a possibility. But I thought while I'd got the book open, I'd have a look and see what it said about foot and mouth. And to my horror this was one of the symptoms. Within half a day, from just the sore teats to the time the ministry vet came, she was a totally classic case: Slathering, sore feet, blisters on her tongue, and skin coming loose. After the animals had been slaughtered, we had the pyre. Claire stayed in the house with the curtains drawn shut. We tried not to let the children see, but they knew what was going on. The fire was lit at 8 o'clock in the evening and the next morning the field in front of the house was full of flames and smoke. Claire said that we had had to burn all the straw, but Fiona (elder daughter) looked at her and said, "Yes, and Daddy's cows". So she knew what was going on. We were case number 82. Now there are over 2000. Being so early put us in a difficult position, because we've been out of business the longest. All the way through the outbreak, the evaluation of the stock has increased, and stock of exactly the same kind and quality as ours have been given nearly three times as much money. Some day we'll have to go to an auction ring to restock, and we'll be bidding against people who got far better compensation than us. Nobody really knows how it spread, that's the big problem. But our government hasn't even taken notice of the reports that were written in 1967. The reports said: "Don't have pyres". And that's exactly what happened, we had lots of pyres in this area. And if we could turn the clock back to February, I think vaccination would have been used. It would have been right to try and stop it from spreading. The government are trying to portray that everything's back to normal, and that footpaths should be open and that its all over. But its as bad now as its ever been really".

(Claire)
"The day after we were diagnosed with foot and mouth, Radio 4 rang up and asked me to contribute to ÔFarming Today'. I kept a diary, which I read on the radio each morning for 3 weeks, basically it was a blow by blow account of what happened. It was just beginning to hit me then, that our fields were empty and there would be no cows grazing there this summer. The fields were silent. Its quite eerie now when you drive around the country. When you come up Wenslydale and spot sheep and cows, you slow down and look at them, and I say to the children, "Look, there are some cows in that field, isn't that a lovely sight?", because we haven't got any of our own. Its a traditional cycle, an aspect of farming that's gone for the time being. Hopefully it's a temporary blip".