We care for them when they are cold, sick, and hungry, the kids play with the pet lamb, and teach the pet calf to play football.

Livestock have their own purpose, and that is chiefly for consumption. We are there when they are born – sometimes we even help them come into the world.

But, as people who work with these animals day in and day out, as people studying agriculture and livestock sciences, as people brimming with ideas for the future of British farming, we understand that there is a line drawn between animals that are livestock, and those that are not.

As owners, keepers, shepherds, managers, contractors, collectively we ensure the care of our animals in our keep, and if we do not, then we face severe consequences – luckily, this does not happen all too often in the UK given that we have amongst the highest standards of animal welfare in the world.

It’s like buying a puppy – something that these activists cannot seem to comprehend. Cats and dogs, even goldfish can be owned, but livestock can’t? Yet we are the ones being accused of “speciesism”!

We gave a considerable sum of hard earned money to a farmer for their hard work raising this here cow, for us to continue to look after it on our farm.

I think that, with these people, the major bone of contention is that they believe that animals cannot be ‘owned’. Well, yes, they can – we bought and paid for them.

We are there in the bad weather, squelching around in the clarts in a bid to ensure their health and wellbeing – I have seen my own father coming home from the hill after dark many a time, because he has used the last remnants of daylight to check the stock; I have been out with him in the pitch black at 10.30pm on a March night in the biting wind looking for a Galloway who was calving - the irony of looking for a black cow in the dark.

We are there to vaccinate them, and dose them with minerals, and check their feet, trim their horns, muck them out, feed and water them, scratch their lugs – all very cruel and terrible things like that.

And we are there, ultimately, when it is time for them to die.

We carefully load them into the wagon, they are taken to the slaughterhouse and – this bit is important – humanely slaughtered. The next time we see them, they are on our plates.

Alongside a helping of steaming British grown tatties and veg, a wee smatter of gravy and possibly some mint sauce, it is the epitome of a healthy meal for a hardworking farmer – or indeed, as it has been shown time and time again, for anybody.

Any farmer will tell you that there is nothing wrong with this. And whatever your views on humane slaughter, just remember that it is not your place to say.

It is not your place to interfere with our livelihoods – we have an understanding of these animals far superior than you. We are utilising the millennia of knowledge passed down from the days the first animals were domesticated.

You are using what, exactly? Bold claims from PETA?

I have not entered into this with the intention of attacking a group of people, but when said group of people are so blasé, so ignorant towards the very people that make up the bones of society, so militant and dare I say, extremist, it cannot be helped that I vehemently argue my case to fight back against this damning act upon me and my likeminded countryfolk.

When it comes to the point where these activists are swarming onto our land and opening our gates, turning up at our shows and letting livestock out, protesting at our marts and slaughterhouses, deliberately entering into discussions on farming forums across social media and slandering us with some of the vilest hatred I have ever experienced, that is the point where we farmers stop listening.

Should these people take issue with what we do, we are not the people they should dictate to. Asking us to turn into ‘vegan farmers’ is laughable. What do you want us to do?

Cut down the little remaining forestry in a bid to grow soya and the fashionable quinoa like what is happening in the Amazon? I think not – I’m not even sure you should eat something that is pronounced differently to the way it’s spelt, frankly!

To the activists I say this: we were here long before you, and we’ll be here long after.

Whatever Mother Nature threw at us, whatever legislation changes we underwent, whatever way the market prices swung, we endured it all.

Nothing you can say will change the fact that we will always be here, maintaining the countryside and feeding our nation. Do not forget this.