Farming in Woolsery since the war
Posted on November 19, 2015 | By cbutlerwoolsery | 2 responses
This morning Ashmansworthy class were lucky enough to have a visit from Gordon Lott and James Cann. Gordon has been a farmer for over 80 years and has experienced massive changes in farming over that time. James has a dairy farm in Stroxworthy and was able to tell us how technology has changed the way farming is done today. The main difference was that during and after the war, everything on the farm had do be done by hand. There were no tractors and other machinery to help with the crops and animals. Farms needed many labourers or land girls in order to get all the work done. Nowadays, farms have expensive machinery to enable larger areas of land to be used for crops, and automated dairies which can milk many cows at a time. This means that farmers can have more animals and larger areas of land in order to produce more crops and dairy products at a price that the consumer is happy to pay. James brought in two horseshoes that he had dug up after he ploughed a field. He told us that the field hadn’t been plough for probably 100 years and it needed reseeding. He also showed us the GPS unit that the tractors use to help the farmers when they are working on their land.
Many thanks to Ashmansworthy Class and staff for a great welcome today. Hope you enjoyed the cheese and learnt something about farming. We are very lucky to have a great farmer like Gordon Lott in our Parish. Some great facts from Gordon about farming from 1930-1950.
Thank you for coming in and talking to the class today. Yes, we are very luck to have Gordon in our village to help us understand the past and bring history to life.