This is an edited version of a film that I made 45 years ago. Shot on Kodachrome 8mm film, it shows just how labour intensive farming was in the mid seventies.
Hard work brought back a lot of memories working on a 350 mixed arable in N Yorkshire. Class 14’ cut combine, Ford 4000, fordson Dexter and major rear loader mucking out etc. Great banter among the team
That's interesting, she came to the farm second hand with quite a bit of previous use and several knocks. At the time it was a luxury just to have a cab.
Front loaders on a Fordson Major were hard to use without power steering, as the steering was very heavy anyway. I loved the noise from the Simms diesel injector pump.
With a rear loader, and a good load in the bucket, the front wheels were very light on the ground. This made steerage a bit variable. It all makes for a good video.
The idea was right enough as on the back end so more grip rather than front end loaders, Cameron Gardener was the one of the popular makes of rear loaders, mill and mix another popular one, using your own corn saved money but was time consuming but it made the job profitable, and that’s obviously key to survival.
Wow, used to do the same back then with the grain, into a bath tub with the auger in it and add “PropCorn” acid as the grain moisture content was slightly high and had no driers, then had to go in the self assembled hardboard & gutter bolt grain silo and shovel the grain around so the silo didn’t distort and the acid would burn your eyes, funny enough I was only describing this to someone this week… Great video
Really brought back memories of my childhood spent on the small family farm where l learnt to drive a fordson dexta and super major, and my uncles wore exactly the same style of clothes Happy Happy days 😊
74 year i was born i remember those machines well as they were still in every day use into the 90s here in Ireland in the hill farms.....i have an uncle who farmed with horses until the early 80's so these machines would have been a step up...😊
We had front end loaders on grey fergys and Nuffields in the early sixties, one hell of a lot better than a muck fork, seems slow nowadays but was a godsend at the time 🙂
@@davesdigitalmovies it was but persistent made it bearable, what was the alternative then, front loader with no grip in wet conditions, neither was much fun to be honest but it beat a muck fork, and when your young and stupid, you’ll make it work 😂
Fantastic. That muck spreader looks tiny today but at the time must have it would have been the greatest thing after spreading dumped piles with a fork. Great video
@@davesdigitalmovies I’ve loaded many by hand in the early 70s on a nice frosty morning same model as that , Bamfords I think . Not a pleasant job putting it back on when the chain comes off that’s if you can find all the bits 🙂👍
Ground barley and maize with a malt product added, plus other serial additives. Never much left overs from the house, we were always hungry back in the day.!!
Thanks for these little films. Shame you don't have smell-o-vision though your images are vivid enough to evoke those memories! The burning grass brought out another old memory - do you remember stubble burning? I wasn't very old by the time it was phased out but I remember being scared of the big clouds of smoke on the horizon or hearing of stubble burning getting 'out of control'. Probably been watching a film on volcanoes! Also remember often being taken to see the pigs being fed in my home village - wasn't too keen on them until I got a bit older. Cheers again!
Times have changed a bit since those days. Re: burning stubble, we always cultivated a fire break before lighting up, nice warm job on a cold day. Thanks for your comments, more short films to follow!
