The power of machinery

I went out to cut back the potato haulms with my scythe today, just in time to find the man with the mower had arrived to cut the grass for sileage.

We have about five acres of field down to grass at the moment plus assorted patches in the coppice, along the fencelines, ditches and tracks, and around the buildings.

It takes me a day’s hard work with the scythe once a fortnight to keep those patches trimmed back and would take me about eight to 10 days to completely mow the field.

Annoying the radical vegans - again

I’ve had yet another email from a vegan who objects to the fact that I’ve used the word in a “perjorative” manner while displaying my “prejudices”.

And yet again, they appear to have missed the point.

I do not have a problem with people who have a vegan lifestyle, or who adopt a vegetarian or other similar diet.

Meat should cost more

One of the more unsustainable features of modern western lifestyles is meat consumption, which has soared on the back of extremely low prices for meat.

Supermarket power and consumer “choice” have combined to force meat prices to a point below the cost of production for some time, a situation that could only continue in the relative short term thanks to comparatively low prices for oil and animal feeds.

Farmers have pointed out for some time that western consumers must pay more for meat - and other primary produce - but have generally been ignored with the result that many farmers either leave the land or turn it to more profitable use.

Time to book a pig into the abattoir

With the Scottish restrictions on livestock being moved to slaughter being eased still further, we’ve decided to book Rocket, our Berkshire porker, in with Scotch Premier as soon as they can take her.

We’d like to keep her until she reaches 80kg liveweight, which usually provides around 55kg of meat, but if there any new outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease we could find ourselves stuck with a pig that can’t be sent for slaughter for weeks.

When I rang Scotch Premier earlier today, they were still clearing the backlog of commercial pigs so the earliest, most convenient date I could get Rocket in for private slaughter was Tuesday, 11 September.