"Young Farmers" (and why you should not drink a pint of champagne)

After our holiday to Oman to visit friends we were looking forwards to getting our hands dirty after a well earned break.  However little was done in December in the run up to Christmas with trips to London and a busy time at work.  

The only brief bit of work that was carried out was to get a flail mower in to take any bumps and anthills out of the 2ac pony paddock and to top it so that it is ready for the new growing season.  Flailing (cross between a topper and a chipper) produces a very fine mulch that will fertilise the remaining land, however it can spread weeds too so grazing and careful management is needed.  

Flailing is unselective and takes everything back to soil, we had the opportunity to blitz the entire eight acres back to bare paddock and destroy all the gorse but we felt that this was too destructive.  We want to work alongside the wildlife and manage the grazing areas carefully.  After seeing what sort of result the flail mower achieved, although useful in some areas, we decided we will happily continue clearing the rest by hand.  (Although Woody still insists he needs a tractor!)

Newly flailed 2 acres

Flail mower reduces everything from small trees down to mulch.

Safe from the mower; The wooly 5.5acres in December sunshine.

Christmas itself was quiet but we spent it catching up with family and pottering about at home with only a couple of brief visits to the land.

New Years was a different matter altogether!
Our lovely "land neighbours" invited to their NYE barn party, dress code; Farmers.

A barn, rope swing from the rafters and a wheelchair made for a messy evening.  In the excitement of a piggyback race (no that is not a euphemism) I may have jumped on Woody from a hay bale landing on my face in the dirt of the barn floor, bloody everywhere but I got away with keeping all my teeth!  After carrying on till beyond 4am we were found snoozing with the dogs, in a pile of horse rugs in the hay barn the next morning.  What a night!  How lucky are we to have such cool neighbours!

Happy 2015 Everyone!