Tilling the root break

After spending a couple of hours servicing the BCS 715, the Wee ‘Un and I headed out to start tilling the root break. I use a heavy hand hoe to roughly level the field before running the rotary hoe over it to produce a fine tilth. The slope, plus the uneven ground, means I have to wander about, sometimes walking on tilled soil, to maintain control and keep a good line. I then use a push, tined cultivator to break up the compaction caused by my footprints, lift large stones to the surface and clear out grass roots. Even though this field has been ploughed for us, there’s still a lot of hard work involved. In fact, ploughing doesn’t actually lessen the hard work. Instead, it allows us to cultivate an even larger area for the same amount of work. We’ll be out again day after day for weeks, tilling, cultivating, planting and sowing until all three fields that will be down to vegetables are in production. After that, it’s months of hand hoeing to keep the weeds down. It is fun—really!

The Telegraph can surprise

The Telegraph is nicknamed the Torygraph with good reason, but unlike some newspapers it doesn’t always allow politics to get in the way of good journalism.

But even I was surprised to find Confessions of an Eco Sinner: Long-distance calling amongst its offerings this morning.

It’s a hard hitting look at the personal impact of the Western obsession with consumer gadgets and deserves a wide audience.

If you only read one story in the Telegraph, make it this one.

Getting the BCS 715 ready for work

With ploughing finished in the root break, it’s time to start breaking the soil down to a fine tilth for planting jerusalem artichokes, onion sets and potatoes, as well as drilling mangel seeds. This is one of the few jobs for which we have mechanical aid, so I rolled the BCS 715 two-wheel tractor out of the garage this morning to service it and prepare it for work. I drain it of petrol, give it a thorough clean and oil bare metal before putting it into winter storage, but I prefer to service it immediately before putting it to work as it means it gets a thorough check. I started by giving the 715 a good scrub to remove the dust and then drained the old oil from the sump. The old oil is added to a barrel that I keep for oiling tools. (A safety note: Disconnect the spark plug before doing any work on the 715.)