. . . we must be doing something right!
In a perfect world we would have finished second cut silage the beginning of August, but as we all know this year's weather has been anything but perfect. We have snatched the odd field of big bales, and at the end of August in a very small window of fine weather we got about 45 acres of mainly flat fields. Most of you will know that some of our fields are not flat, and even the smallest banking can become impossible to travel on when it's wet. And the ground has got wetter and wetter. We needed more than one fine day, not to dry the grass, but for the ground to dry out underneath. The weather forecasts have been rather vague, promising fine weather - but with the possibility of patchy rain in Cumbria (yes - but where and when!). But having checked the seaweed we got the mower out. James mowed as much as he could, but when the tractor started to slide away, our contractor came to help out with his bigger tractor.
There's a bit of a clue to the steepness in the field names - Front Bank, Back Bank, Strickley Hill, Brant (old word for steep). Photographs of most of our fields are on this page of our website.
Henry rowed up the grass to give the ground as much chance as possible to dry out, and last night we started picking up. One of the problems of silaging so late in the year is that it gets darker much sooner, and driving a tractor and trailer crossways across a steep bank in the dark is maybe not the wisest move. Today started off dull and overcast, but it seemed to be as good as it was going to get. And the sun came out and continued to shine so we were able to get 45 acres in the pit by milking.
So that's it for now. We may make a few more big bales, but at the moment it's sighs of relief all round. After milking Henry and James will work till dark tidying and rolling the pit, ready to sheet it up.
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