Our plan to go to Brighton for the day has been dashed by Thameslink not running trains “until at least midday” due to the rail stretching yesterday. Bollocks.
Can’t you go in the car?
Guffaw.
would have found another excuse in any case.
19 here thankfully
Have really struggled sleeping this week
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Still 28° here.
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27 here, but compared to the last two days, quite pleasant 
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Sam has access to specialist meteorological forecasts for farming - tends to be a mite more accurate than the stuff most of us have access to. Current forecast for this corner of East Anglia for the last week in July is a maximum of 1mm of rain…
The month to date there has been more rain in the Sahara region (5mm), than here 
Meanwhile, two fields over from where I’m typing, another farm operator has spent 3 days ploughing and harrowing ~100 acres - in hot, dry conditions with a constant stiff breeze. There are no hedgerows, just huge open fields, and their efforts ensure that moisture retaining clay particles, and nutrient-containing organic particles are all winnowed out of the soil, leaving behind infertile sand and silt…
Despair, heaped upon despair, and soil heaped upon that - what an ignominious burial…
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You know how fate - like Meatmen - is ever-vigilant to prove an exception to any sweeping statement of the absolute?
Brief shower…
Should have trusted the spiders: not seen a decent sized spider in ages - last night all sorts trotting about the place, and they only usually do that in when rain is about (most spiders are pretty poor at osmoregulation).
Interesting the difference in field size I noticed when I was in Netherlands recently. Smaller, less than 10 acres each. Surrounded by drainage ditches, obvious thin top spoil, couple of feet, then sand. Might just need to do that because of drainage, but lots of hedge rows and fields left fallow. Even live stock were on same small field size.
Like I said, might just be drainage requirements, but I suspect not. They have been at it a bit longer than us, maybe their system works better?
I have no clue, just noticed the difference.
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Not sure about Holland but one of the main reasons for difference in field sizes in Britain and France is down to inheritance laws.
In the UK historically the oldest son inherits the land (2nd Son Army or Navy, 3rd Son the Church) etc so the land stays together.
In France it tends to be split equally which leads to much smaller inefficient farms.
France is a nation of smallholdings rather than farms. Not very efficient but makes farmers a large vociferous political group.
I was thinking more of Holland and new Holland where Paul is, as the main element is drainage. I’ll do some research, will I’ll Google it, see if it is inheritance based.
In this country the rot set in with Enclosures, when the landed gentry stole common land rights… But that’s another story😁
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There’s overlap, but Dutch and Flemish drainage is a little more to do with flood control than here, as they mostly have porous subsoil and underlying geology, whereas from York to Essex, it’s mostly clay subsoils and underlying geology, making general soil drainage more important - the land ‘poaches’ and ‘rots’ easily; a road near us is called ‘Rotten Row’ for just that reason.
Megafields are a legacy of 1960s and '70s farming ‘innovations’, we’ve a couple of decades of research demonstrating that (e.g.) hedgerows are not just good for biodiversity, but are also beneficial to crops by harbouring tiers of predators that provide natural biological control. Wind-blown soil-loss is huge round here - and it’s the most important stuff that goes.
There are BIG problems with British farming - mostly deriving from decades of food under-pricing, but one of the big ones is lack of youngsters: it’s all crusty old farts that went to ag-college in the 70s and 80s and who are too old to change their ways. This isn’t just bad environmentally, it means farming doesn’t adapt to all kinds of change, and that’s REALLY showing-up right now.
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This. Big is better. Bigger machines. Less workers. More profit. Kill the hedgerows. Destroy everything. More profit. Oops, now we’re fucked. Grab grants. Leave field edges for wildlife. More profit…
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FFS 33c here already, not going to survive the weekend, golf tomorrow and a garden party on saturday 
My astroturf is still holding its natural lush green well
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Pictures or we won’t believe it.