Stacks of hard work as we get the hay sorted
WHAT a great week, with day upon day of glorious sunshine.
For the children there has been fun swimming, snorkelling and splashing in the beck whereas for us there’s been the prospect of finally finishing haytime.
The field in which the hay was to be made had been left until last owing to the fact that it is one of our most awkward.
It is seriously steep with bumps and bogs that make it a nightmare to negotiate with the tractors and associated haymaking machinery.
Even our small old-fashioned rusting implements that wouldn’t look out of place in a scrapyard struggle with the terrain.
The haybob encountered enough rocks to cause it to lose almost half its spikes.
It was almost comforting to hear the reassuring clank of the baler completing the whole process and depositing the small rectangular bales all over the field. But however hot it gets it is impossible to shed too many layers of clothes as the hay is extremely scratchy.
The children were very enthusiastic about helping out, rolling the bales into small heaps to make it easier for us to pile them on to the trailer.
Loading is quite an art, for if the bales aren’t stacked tightly then the rough journey home can soon lead to them all falling off and then it’s a question of starting all over again.
By the time the field was cleared of hay bales it was early evening and the last trailer load that arrived at the barn coincided perfectly with the emergence of the midges.
A conveyor belt of people either rolled, shoved or threw the bales to one another.
Eventually, after a lot of sweating, the trailer was emptied for the final time and we could close the door to the barn – literally stacked to the rafters with the winter’s food.
A job well done... the only disappointment was the lack of hot water for a shower – the fire having never been lit!
We took a leaf out of the children’s book and opted for an al fresco shower in the small waterfall in the beck.