Category Archives: Food

When Giants Meet!

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I never know what my topic is going to be from day to day. In fact for the last two days there has been no topic as I’ve been busy catching up on post-harvest paperwork. Driving on a small country road last night, today’s topic pulled out in front of me from a farmer’s field, or rather provided a topic when it met a same-species but distant cousin further down the road…

Two giants met on a country road,
on their travels from field to field.
One politely said “After you my dear!”
the other said “No, I shall yield!”
The hedge on one side seemed perilously close,
the ditch seemed rather deep,
both drivers waved from their high up cabs,
one let out a rather shrill ‘peep!’
Further along I followed Ms Yellow,
Ms Green had gone off to harvest some wheat,
“Do you think my backside looks rather big?”
I replied, “it looks rather complete!”
Then all of a sudden she turned off the road,
strode up a longish farm track,
“Goodbye and Good Luck,” I shouted,
but alas all I saw was her back!
If you come across giants today, smile sweetly and they’ll continue on their way!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

 

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Harvest Home!

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Last Saturday night at 8:59pm we finished harvest. Harvest 2017 is now consigned to our history as one where we rode our luck and came out the other side relatively unscathed. My faithful Mavic-Pro drone recorded the last harvesting moments, little did I know then that my daughter had taken over driving the combine (under instruction)…

No more beans to harvest in the field,
no more loads to help the yield,
no more bindweed seed in the barn,
no more watching the sky with alarm!
no more listening for the home-coming trailer,
no more “sounds like here comes the baler!”
no more dust masks making sweaty face,
no more dirt lines in the bath to trace!
no more postponed meals at night,
no more worrying if the quality’s right,
no more calls from the combine driver’s phone
We can now say “Harvest is home!”
The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

 

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Storm Clouds Gathering!

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Yesterday evening as we were harvesting beans, storm clouds were gathering on the horizon in an attempt to halt our progress. We knew we had been so lucky with the weather this harvest and thought our luck would not hold yet again. So we awaited the cloud’s wrath…

With an almost Gallic shrug of the shoulders,
we shouted “Show us your worst!”
and continued harvesting beans,
awaiting an inevitable cloud-burst!
When it came it was quite pathetic,
a dampening outside the grain store,
hardly a drop down the field,
we had been expecting much more!
So onward we continued to combine,
until we were ready to go home,
the storm had gone away round us,
for all we cared down to Rome!

…then just as we were standing in the shed having a post-harvest beer (to wash the dust down, you understand!) the heavens opened! With such luck I should have chosen lottery numbers!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

 

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The Camouflaged Bales!

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Yesterday I drove across the fields to see if the contractors had completed baling the straw. When I came across some oat bales and snapped one with my phone, I was surprised how well they blended into the background. Then I realised ! was just having a ‘durrrr’ moment and perhaps it was time to switch the brain back on…

Hiding in the field,
like a giant’s cereal biscuit,
could you manage one for breakfast?
Would you dare risk it?
They’re off to the power station,
to make electricity,
pulses down some wires,
to light a distant city!
When they come to collect,
I hope they find them all,
or they’ll trick some unwary walker,
and misfortune will befall!

Many apologies for the poor and obscure rhyming couplets this morning, I’m blaming it on the weather! Have a great day and watch out for those camouflaged bales, maybe things will improve when I have my new glasses!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

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The Last Oats!

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After a delay in harvest of four rain-soaked days, we finally managed to get back to the field and combine the last of the oats. This mornings picture shows the moment the drone captured the topping-up of the last trailer-load from the combine yesterday afternoon. Now all we have left to harvest is the beans which aren’t ready yet…

The last of the oats are in the bin,
my ‘white-strawed’ harvest is now in.
All that is left 86 acres of beans,
(not the sort found in High-School canteens!).
Up to the last, luck was here,
clouds always present during harvest this year.
I wish other farmers sunshine not showers,
so their wives can see smiles, not endless glowers!

I hope you all have a warm sunny weekend!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

 

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Emptying The Barn!

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It is at this point in the farming year that I start to get nervous. The wheat has all been harvested and lorries start to take the wheat from the farm. All of a sudden the heap diminishes and doubts creep in as to whether there is enough to fulfil the contracts that I signed back in January when the plant was no higher than the toe of my wellie. Yesterday we loaded 180 tonnes and suddenly there is an ominous echo around the barn…

Eight loads of wheat have gone,
there’s space now in the barn,
Two-hundred and forty tonnes,
I have a sense of alarm!
‘Will there? Won’t there? Be enough?’
a little voice says to me!
and all that I can say in return,
“We shall just have to wait and see!”

If you’re sending grain away today, I hope you have no rejections or moisture claims! It also looks as if combines might roll again today.

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

 

 

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Pondering the Precipitation!

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When I opened the curtains this morning something was wrong. It was then that I realised it was August 10th and it wasn’t raining! As soon as I was dressed I went out to the rain gauge. The result was greater than I’ve ever seen before, an amount usually found in parts of Wales, the West Country and Scotland. The lawn has grown so much I could crop it for silage and a new lake has shown up my laziness in not clearing a blocked drain…

An inch-and-a-quarter of rain has fallen,
according to my rain gauge,
a new record precipitation,
for this climate-change age!
The ducks and geese are ecstatic,
they can’t believe their luck,
as for the combine in the field,
I think it may be stuck!
Maybe we’ll continue harvest soon!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

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The Lucky Farmer!

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Yesterday it rained on my parade! We were on the home straight of our harvest and had just about 20 acres of oats to finish when the heavens opened (there are also 80 acres of beans which aren’t yet ready to harvest). I was, as the media would have said ‘visibly upset!’ However when I considered how much wheat is left on other farms, I put my self-pity back in the drawer and felt sorry for others…

On the floor in the shed,
a heap of wheat not yet bread!
Outside the fields are stubble now,
awaiting patiently the tractor and plough!
Twenty acres of oats still wait,
for a return of summer – another date!
The happiest in the rain is a mallard duck,
and this old farmer who can’t believe his luck!

Picture taken with a Mavic Pro drone inside the shed, perilously close to the roof, but I managed not to crash!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

 

Share

It Can’t be Raining!

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All of a sudden we are in harvest! The combine is plodding up and down the field, the grain cart is rushing to and fro filling the store and one eye is firmly fixed upon the dark clouds that encircle the farm. Then the worst case scenario – it starts to rain. However there is an old combine drivers saying…

‘It can’t be raining,
if you ignore the wipers’,
the sun is hiding,
behind storm clouded vipers!

I find myself carting,
wheat to the barn,
there is rain on the windscreen,
I shriek with alarm!

All of a sudden,
the precipitation gone
such a good job,
I didn’t turn the wipers on!
…and then my son-in-law, John, arrives back from holiday in France and jumps straight on the tractor. Good luck twice in one day, it could be my lucky harvest!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

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The Lonely Combine!

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The last few days have shown little evidence of summer. Frequent showers have meant that harvest for some has been a damp, stop/start affair. Farmers have to wait until wheat is dry enough to store or sell and the magic reading on the oft-sworn-at moisture meter is 15%. A neighbour’s giant green combine has spent a lonely  weekend in a half cut field. More combines have been abandoned in fields this weekend than if there had been a zombie invasion…

Like a giant feeding animal,
chained on a far too short tether,
the Class Lexion combine,
is awaiting dry weather.
Abandoned when the storm hit,
the driver dashed to the farm,
leaving it alone and abandoned,
Harvest stop-start with alarm!
Fast forward to this morning,
with moisture meter they’ll go
pray for a good reading
and harvest will flow!

Whatever your harvest is, whether behind a desk or in a field, have a good one today!

© Baldock Bard 2017
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard
E-mail: simon.holtom@btconnect.com

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 25 YEARS!
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

2017 Season
EVERY SATURDAY MORNING!
until mid-October
With more FREE parking and a field full of bargains!
www.u-boot.co.uk

 

Share