Free-Range Living

 ' Good grumpy-ing -----  ?'

   The incessant gloomy weather without too much sun recently here at the organic eco micro-holding (small smallholding) in the UK heartlands can be a bit of a 'downer', affecting the spirits, even, erm, producing the odd 'grumpy' moment,  but now that January has gone at least thoughts can turn to the coming growing season. Home-saved broad bean seed will soon go in the ground, just 'shovelled' in under an old car windscreen, to be then planted out in the second half of March to get an early blackfly-beating crop.  Quite a few are grown as not only do they supply delicious (if picked young and fresh) produce to eat early in the season when not a lot else is about (or for freezing), but they also supply in the form of haulms and stalks, quite a bit of material for the compost heap - the future's fertility. And just for good measure, being a legume, broad beans fix nitrogen from the atmosphere into the soil -can't be bad - nature's gift, as is the full blossom now (early Feb. ) on a plum tree in the paddock's mini orchard,  about a good month earlier than usual , too early, in fact ----

Half the veg growing ground will get a layer of woodash  and a couple of layers of well-made two-year old compost in a few days time, all delivered by shank's pony (i.e. on foot) and a couple of buckets - a satisfying 'replenishing'/ 'taking care' type of operation. Seed potatoes have already been purchased - with difficulty - one largish chain of suppliers hitherto keeeping prices reasonable, this year in their wisdom have tried to be 'clever' and are selling them in far smaller packages - trying maybe to disguise that the price level is a lot higher - ? Presumably they mustn't have too high a regard for their customers' 'common sense' levels - ? It was a case of 'thanks , guys, but no thanks', and a trip to a smaller local supplier, with more reasonable price levels, only then to find that prices were noticeably cheaper again at a useful local 'potato fayre' ------- hey, ho.

'Blight battles --- '

The battle against blight, the organic potato growers main foe, will be resumed this year, with the early variety 'Pentland Javelin' , which has the curious quality of also being an early maincrop variety, going in early (end February time) under plastic, a strategy which last year produced a reasonable crop. Then 'Kestrel', a second-early blight resisitant variety will follow-on, to be then followed by a maincrop variety -'Sharpo Mira' - which apparently is one of the most blight-resistant of all. The general aim is to be able to produce around half a year's home-grown organic supply, which with luck and a prevailing wind, may come to pass. As ever in the growing game, hope springs eternal ----

 At the aforementioned recent local 'potato fayre' a couple of anti-blight varieties were located at reasonable cost - one ( main crop 'Allouette') was even virtually guaranteed to be blight free - in this case, the 'proof of the pudding' will be before the eating - when the crop is dug -----  This variety was hitherto not known here, as were many of the over one hundred varieties available at this event, the choice was bewildering - who would have thought that so many existed - ? Good to see them all, though - an event of considerable interest.

'Risky ---- ?'

Maybe the tag of 'grumpies' has come about via a 'youngist'-geared culture, in which 'success' could seem to have become almost an automatic 'given' - ? One consultant colleague was chastised for being 'negative' by a group of budding very positive young entrepreneurs to whom he was kindly imparting his knowledge and experience. He was trying to bring an awareness to them that often (always - ?) things don't always go to plan ('the best laid plans of mice and men') and that therefore business success is not guaranteed. Investing time , energy, emotion and money 'now', in anticipation of returns at some point 'in the future', involves risk - things can 'go wrong' (egs. economic downturns, changing markets, climate influences, changing consumer patterns etc. etc,) and then present the business and its owner(s) with hurdles to overcome.

The consultant knew also through his experience that over-confident planning through 'rose coloured spectacles' can lead to over optimism and over positivity, which in itself could be a risk to future business success. His audience though, didn't apparently stop to think that this guy did have a lot of actual experienc, whereas they had very little, and gave him a hard time, probably seeing him as a 'Mr. Grumpy' because of his 'negative' approach focusing on possible problems. (having seen some hundreds of rural businesses, though, 'close up', as it were, it would be hard to remember a single one that had not experienced 'negative' conditions to overcome at some point along the business journey way).

'On the up with a 'downer' --- ?'

Often borrowed capital is needed for a business start-up, which banks provide. Being careful, risk-averse ,(erm, historically anyway) organisations, and knowing the 'rose-coloured specs' syndrome, banks like to look at what they call 'the downside picture'. ' Ok, let's hope things go 'tickety boo', but if harder times/problems are encountered, how do things stack up then?' They are impressed and therefore more disposed to lending the money, if the business plans presented to them show a 'downside analysis', which hopefully then shows that whilst things might get tight for a stretch, the difficult time(s) can be squeezed through. (if such 'squeeze viability' isn't shown, then the question becomes as to whether it's a an enterprise which would anyway be viable in the longer-term - ?).

In the case-study quoted above, it may have been that the consultant focused a bit too strongly on the area of posible/probable problem areas, knowing that over-enthusiasm and positivity were in themselves dangers, but coming over then, for his young audience, as too negative. Of course enthusiasm and a positive approach are needed and are natural at the beginning of a project - nothing would probably get done otherwise, but keeping at least one foot on the ground is also wise to ensure long-term success as well as short-term viability. To see someone's dream enterprise 'flounder on the rocks' is not a pleasant experience, as it isn't for them, so maybe just a bit of 'grumpy-ness' in the mix is not so bad - ? Experienced people who have 'gone through the mill' are presumably then reasonably equipped to face hardships and reverses, so then can take the 'balanced' multi-dimensional approach to life, coping with the positives and the negatives, and like Kipling (' those twin imposters, success and failure') able to keep them in perspective - ? One local hostelry even has a 'grumpy' club, although looking at its members the other night quaffing ale after their meeting, 'grumpy' would not exactly be the word to describe them ----

'Rural 'enduring' ------

Watching a TV documentary about a family farming a UK upland sheep farm in the north of England in harsh winter conditions recently reminded of the reality of hard times that businesses can have to endure. This farmer quoted the old farmer saying that 'where there's livestock, there's deadstock', which again some might say is too fatalistic - ? In livestock farming, though, deaths do occur that are not the individual farmer's responsibility (for instance, where unaffected flocks/herds are compulsory slaughtered in a notifiable disease outbreak such as foot and mouth). Many of the farmers so hit are emotionally hit, even if they may not show it - it's  often their life's work down the pan, and there is such a thing as  farmer 'care and affection' for their animals  - maybe though decreasing with the advent of larger-scale 'factory farming' (eg. very large herds of dairy cows kept indoors) - ?

'Animal magic ---- '

G was a  black-bearded giant of many accomplishments, who'd take anything in his stride, and who loved working his small/mediumsize dairy farm along with his family - a real 'lifestyle' business. One day he was chatting with his farm adviser outside the end of a cowshed. The adviser suddenly got a nil response to a question, and turning, found the farmer not there. He found G around the corner of the shed quietly sobbing. The adviser had noticed that an old 'knacker' cow had been been loaded up unceremoniously into a wagon as he'd been talking with the farmer. It turned out that this cow was an animal that G knew very well, she'd been one of his 'starter' cows many years ago and had given him many years of productive service. G had no problem showing his feelings - he'd rather gone round the corner to spare embarrassment for his adviser ---

And talking of taking care of animals, time to get into the pen of the 'wild'bunch' (note the sign one crew of relief poultry carers left) mini flock of hens to remove their used wet straw and replace it with clean, bright, dry straw --- and hear their contented 'cluckings and chuck-ings' as they sift through it -----