HOW TO RALLY A COMBINE

READER’S STORY

In my early years in farming, I worked on a small hill farm to the south of Hexham to gain experience. A few years and jobs later and having married, my previous boss approached me.

Claas combine

It was 1963, and he had taken the lease of a 450-acre farm in the south of Northumberland in the Derwent Valley near Ebchester and wanted me to be foreman there. The farm had not been worked well, and quickly it was decided to plough and sow cereals. So, a contractor was taken on to complete the cultivations. As we would later require a combine, we found one of my boss’s university friends, Mr Manners, a farmer near Darlington, could help with one.

Mr Manners