Posts by Malcolm Barker

In his book, ‘A Brief History of Life in the Middle Ages’, Martyn Whittock explains how solar activity affected the weather throughout history.

This has been the wettest winter of the 50 that I have been farming. It is mostly dry in the lambing sheds where I have buckets to catch rain which drips through holes in the roof and can be used to water the sheep in their pens.

The recent request from the council asking farmers to clear the roads of drifts in times of heavy snowfall reminds me of the last time that the village was isolated by drifts, in excess of seven feet!

We are now entering the coldest quarter of the year, with the sun low in the sky and few hours of daylight.

Late Saturday night at the end of Nov. finds me sitting in front of my laptop, pondering, ‘What have I managed to get done during this last month of rain?’

After my banking troubles, I got money into my new bank and paid everyone. I hate owing money, particularly to small businesses who need it most.

It came as a shock, whilst I was paying a bill with my bank card, to find that my bank account of the last 43 years, had been closed without notice. My money is still with them and finally they have sent a cheque, but this is only payable into the account which is already…

I am feeling my age. In my head I am still 22 but when I set off to run after a sheep or a cow, I feel more like 90.

If the weather dries up in the coming month, then that will be perfect. Almost all of the first crop of grass has been made into hay because it was drying out so fast in the sunshine that I just left it for hay.

I write this on the day after Scruton Fest. When I returned home, I checked the sheep because I had a nagging feeling that something was wrong.