At this time of year, the sight of heavy farm combined harvester equipment rumbling across the fields, with a plume of dust behind is etched on my memory, I say memory because for the most part it has been three years since we have enjoyed a BBQ Summer, [Predicted by the Met Office, see my earlier post]. As I type its raining again and my plans to do dinner on the BBQ have been suspended [Friday 17:30pm].
These days farmers do not need much sunshine to get onto a field and harvest the crop. A marked contrast with the days of horse drawn reapers/binders [1830’s and beyond] and also the grain can be quickly got into a drying shed, whereas in earlier times after reaping there was a lot of binding and the sheaves stacked into stooks, to further dry the ears, before being brought to the thresher, I’m tired just thinking about it. Thank goodness for modern energy and engineering systems, without which we’d be looking at a pretty poor harvest this year.
I added some historical details on harvesting on the history site earlier here: Parlington History