Tag: crop

July 24th – One of the sights of summer I’ve so far missed is the crop sprinkler. Near Shenstone today, one solitary spray, watering a field of fine looking potatoes. Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you can get a full rainbow in their mist, but my efforts to find one today wee fruitless. 

If you’re even luckier, it’s near the road, and there’s a delicious game of dare as you try to cycle past without getting sprayed.

Wehen I was a youth, you could hear these – and there would have been large numbers of them – for miles, the light rushing sound and the toc-toc-toc of the rotator, but since crops have switched more to cereals, they’re a rarer sight.

September 16th – I headed back to Brownhills down the canal, and crossed Clayhanger Common for a change. I noticed at the old access driveway, near where the ranger’s hut used to stand a row of sweet chestnuts, with a glorious crop of nuts. I’ve never clocked these before, but they’re in rude health and look beautiful. Considering the history of the land upon which they’re growing, I’d not eat the fruit, but it’s a great thing to see, for sure.

April 5th – While I was battling through the week, so was nature, but in a grander, more impressive way. Come Friday evening, the snow remaining from the heavy falls of two weeks previously was lying only where the heaviest drifts had been. On the hill to the south of Mill Lane, the ridge-step hedgerow had clearly been a snow trap, and was dissipating itself in a beautiful way.

Coming through underneath, the keen, bright emerald green promise of a new crop. Winter melts as spring appears.

March 4th – I came home from Shenstone at sunset. They day hadn’t improved much – coming back necessarily late, my train ticket was invalid and I had to buy a second. All the way back I’d been fighting the kind of tiredness that repeatedly pulls you into slumber, then cruelly snatches you awake, momentarily terrified. I just wanted to be home.

It was chilly, and slightly misty as the sun went down. The countryside around Stonnall, Lynn and Sandhills looked gorgeous in the subtle light and mist. I was still tired, but I couldn’t stop taking pictures. I love the outdoors, even when I’m nearly beaten. It gives me strength.

I note that at Home Farm, at Sandhills, the field that was potatoes last year has been prepared with long, flat, plastic film encased beds, suggesting something delicate. I’m wondering if it’s connected with the pipework I saw being installed last weekend. The geometry and precision of the automated planting and covering is stunning. It’ll be interesting to see what crop emerges.

September 25th – The mystery of the bean field continues. The commute home was grey and made grim by late trains, but at least it was dry. Coming back along green Lane to Walsall Wood, I noted that the fields of beans here – unlike the ones in Lynn, near Stonnall, hadn’t been harvested. They’re just rotting in the fields. Whether that’s the plan, and it’s just a crop rotation technique, or whether the lousy summer ruined the crop, I have no idea, but I’m hoping someone can explain…

June 18th – I noticed cycling back home that the field between the sewage works and Goblin Wood in Walsall Wood seems to be host to a crop of broad beans, or at least, beans of some variety. Last year this field grew quinoa, and I guess growing a legume will re-nitrate the soil for good crop rotation. The crop looks healthy, despite being a little ravaged at the southern edge due to the weather. An interesting and unusual sight.