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One Norfolk tenant farmer I know (he farms in this area, so this comment is not *that* far off-topic) tells me that immediately after WW2 there were 38 full time workers on his arable farm. Today there are just 3, and the landlord's agent insists that that's profligate and there really should only be 2.

 

It's almost as big an employment reduction as women out of domestic service

 

Paul

My father was a cowman almost all his working life and I come from generations of farm workers on both sides of the family. As we were growing up my brothers and sister were told that we could do anything so long as we didn't work on the farm and we learnt a trade. it was hard because we all did farm work during school holidays and I continued during University holidays as well. We all loved farm work but no one in my family now works on a farm.

 

The use of various types of manure during earlier periods including such things as tanning seems unthinkable by modern standards. Sometimes progress is a good thing.

Edited by mullie
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The use of various types of manure during earlier periods including such things as tanning seems unthinkable by modern standards. Sometimes progress is a good thing.

While working in Bermondsey, close to London Bridge station, my office had been at one time a tannery and the area around had been a centre for London's tanning industry and although that pong had long since gone, it must have been a horrific environment in which to live and work. Even at that time, in the 1980s, the Sarson's vinegar factory, wedged between the railway and Tower Bridge Road, produced a very pungent smell, which lingered quite a time after the factory closed as two of its huge wooden storage vats still remained for a couple of years.

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Something funny to share with you, as somehow we've got to muck spreading, sorry, James. I was out walking along a field where a farmer was using a mechanised muck spreader, a hopper thingy towed behind a tractor, with a rotating thrower underneath which was flinging it out in a flat arc at about five feet high behind the trailer. His sheepdog, black and white collie, was trotting behind, and, to keep himself amused, whenever an extra large piece came sailing out, Fido was leaping up in a graceful arc, and catching it in his mouth. It was fascinating to watch.

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Looking at the Furness Wagons MR manure wagon, it is without doors, but was it tanked in any way? Otherwise liquid manure would have leaked all along the track, especially if it got rained on. Mind you I suppose that was no worse than passenger train toilets dumping on the tracks until recently.

One thing to remember - the normal Sewage Works digester beds are built up of layers of stone, just like a railway track ballast-bed. The construction makes an ideal home for the bugs that go "Oh yummy" when they receive the sewage and digest the nasties to leave a good clean soil / compost and clean water outfall.

 

Consequently the track ballast bed is a very good and under-used "Digester bed", which eats the out-fall from track discharge toilets / oil residues from vehicle bearings / conductor rail de-icing fluid / other nasties - leaving clean water to drain through into the soil and water-courses.

 

Of course the top of the track ballast-bed and the underside of vehicles using track discharge toilets is still hazardous to track and train maintainers. One of the benefits of working for LU rather than the main-line was not having to worry about vehicle toilet systems.

 

This info came from a friend who used to ork for Thames Water (?) before joining LU about 20+ years ago.

 

Regards

Chris H

Edited by Metropolitan H
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Feels more like hedging and ditching weather than muck spreading weather right now; any possibility that we could discuss that instead?

 

K

 

Naa... this is proving far too engaging. My father claims that when he was growing up in the very final years of horse-drawn transport after the second world war householders would race out into the road after any passing horse and cart to be first to any pile of droppings for their roses...  

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Naa... this is proving far too engaging. My father claims that when he was growing up in the very final years of horse-drawn transport after the second world war householders would race out into the road after any passing horse and cart to be first to any pile of droppings for their roses...

You'll be telling us next that they used to put it on the rhubarb- we used to have custard on ours......
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You'll be telling us next that they used to put it on the rhubarb- we used to have custard on ours......

 

Dipped in sugar was best. The rhubarb, that is...

 

But perhaps we should try to get back on track. Does anyone have any suggestions for ways to model either a wagonload of manure or a common-or-garden muck heap in 4 mm scale? (Tea leaves were mentioned but what about the straw content?) Then we need Mr Stadden to move on to period agricultural labourers. 

Edited by Compound2632
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Naa... this is proving far too engaging. My father claims that when he was growing up in the very final years of horse-drawn transport after the second world war householders would race out into the road after any passing horse and cart to be first to any pile of droppings for their roses...  

When we lived in Ripon, around 1951, there was a courtyard outside our flat and I remember my mother going out with the coal shovel to collect the horse-droppings after the milkman and his float had departed. Her little garden flourished as a result. Don't forget that there is a team that follows state processions to clear up after the Household Cavalry & RHA. While Bruges' tourist carriages may have built-in pooper-scoopers, they still have to dispose of the contents at the end of the day.

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Dipped in sugar was best. The rhubarb, that is...

 

But perhaps we should try to get back on track. Does anyone have any suggestions for ways to model either a wagonload of manure or a common-or-garden muck heap in 4 mm scale? (Tea leaves were mentioned but what about the straw content?) Then we need Mr Stadden to move on to period agricultural labourers. 

 

Agricultural labourers by Stadden.  A good idea.

 

Andrew Stadden is open to suggestions.  I have, in the past, made a number, including children and railway workers.  I feel that if others were to drop him an email, there is a reasonable prospect of some of the suggested sets emerging.

 

Among the suggestions I have made are:

 

- Edwardian country workers - agricultural labourers, hedgers/ditchers, gardeners, road-menders.  I daresay there would be smocks, gaiters and string-tied trousers!

 

- Edwardian servants - some in working and some in travelling clothes.  Very many were in service and, so far, I have not seen Victorian or Edwardian layouts reflect this adequately. Those First Class passengers need to be accompanied by Ladies Maids and Valets in travelling clothes.  Others could be in their working dress. Even modest middle class households had at least one servant, so really there should be house maids in evidence.  Coachman, Footman, Butler, Cook! 

 

If anyone else is interested in these subjects, please let Mr Stadden know.

 

Turning to hedges, I have made the, possibly unwise decision to model Castle Aching in May-time, which will involve riotous flora.  Though Riotous Flora might just be a local tearaway ...

 

Anyway, I attach a picture of a Cambridgeshire hedge, laid around February-March if I recall, showing its condition in May.  This would be a great thing to attempt in model form, I think.

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Dipped in sugar was best. The rhubarb, that is...

 

But perhaps we should try to get back on track. Does anyone have any suggestions for ways to model either a wagonload of manure or a common-or-garden muck heap in 4 mm scale? (Tea leaves were mentioned but what about the straw content?) Then we need Mr Stadden to move on to period agricultural labourers. 

How about shredding Woodland Scenics field grass and mixing with tea leaves? Not tried it but it might work. I tend to mix tea leaves with acrylic paint and then either grind with the Dremel or push through an old tea strainer to get the right sizes.

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Dipped in sugar was best. The rhubarb, that is...

 

But perhaps we should try to get back on track. Does anyone have any suggestions for ways to model either a wagonload of manure or a common-or-garden muck heap in 4 mm scale? (Tea leaves were mentioned but what about the straw content?) Then we need Mr Stadden to move on to period agricultural labourers.

Just a thought:

The straw should be fairly easy- lots of fibres such as static grass (without the static!) or for the cheapskates like me, cut up bits of unravelled string (sisal?/ garden string).

For the manure, which would be clumped in among the straw (?) stained or painted poppy seeds (easily available from Asian shops) glued together? I am thinking of horse droppings here

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Agricultural labourers by Stadden.  A good idea.

 

Andrew Stadden is open to suggestions.  I have, in the past, made a number, including children and railway workers.  I feel that if others were to drop him an email, there is a reasonable prospect of some of the suggested sets emerging.

 

Among the suggestions I have made are:

 

- Edwardian country workers - agricultural labourers, hedgers/ditchers, gardeners, road-menders.  I daresay there would be smocks, gaiters and string-tied trousers!

 

- Edwardian servants - some in working and some in travelling clothes.  Very many were in service and, so far, I have not seen Victorian or Edwardian layouts reflect this adequately. Those First Class passengers need to be accompanied by Ladies Maids and Valets in travelling clothes.  Others could be in their working dress. Even modest middle class households had at least one servant, so really there should be house maids in evidence.  Coachman, Footman, Butler, Cook! 

 

If anyone else is interested in these subjects, please let Mr Stadden know.

 

Turning to hedges, I have made the, possibly unwise decision to model Castle Aching in May-time, which will involve riotous flora.  Though Riotous Flora might just be a local tearaway ...

 

Anyway, I attach a picture of a Cambridgeshire hedge, laid around February-March if I recall, showing its condition in May.  This would be a great thing to attempt in model form, I think.

 

Langleys do a set of Victorian/Edwardian maids and some gardeners.  I know these are not the same quality as Stadden's figures but are, I think acceptable.  (Their earlier figures I think are better than their later ones.)  The maids are all doing housework, (so they should be) and will be attached to various houses on my layout once the houses get built.  I may well put a vote in for servants, but he will probably want to do 5 male, 5 female and they will, if his previous models are anything to go by, all be posing for pictures.  Anyway before he does servants he needs to do sitting down 1860s folk as I have coaches waiting for passengers.  ;)  

 

I do have at least a couple of figures who think that they are modern day free German citizens, but will, sooner or later, find that they are a Welsh Victorian Cook, and a General Maid cleaning a window.

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I'd agree with fenmans comments on the de-manning of farms, the farm that surrounds me now has no employees. All work is done by contractors or a field may be rented directly to the company that wants to grow something and they arrange it all.

My rubarb does well, I just stop off at a near by field, and pick up bags of droppings for free...

 

As for a steaming piles in a yard I'd be tempted to model it in plasticine, by scratching the shapes in the surface and using some yellow flock pushed in . Maybe a smoke unit underneath for a little steam.

The lumps in horse droppings are individually often less than 3 inches across, that's only 1mm in 4mm, exceedingly difficult to model in true scale...

Edited by TheQ
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I'd agree with fenmans comments on the de-manning of farms, the farm that surrounds me now has no employees. All work is done by contractors or a field may be rented directly to the company that wants to grow something and they arrange it all.

My rubarb does well, I just stop off at a near by field, and pick up bags of droppings for free...

 

As for a steaming piles in a yard I'd be tempted to model it in plasticine, by scratching the shapes in the surface and using some yellow flock pushed in . Maybe a smoke unit underneath for a little steam.

The lumps in horse droppings are individually often less than 3 inches across, that's only 1mm in 4mm, exceedingly difficult to model in true scale...

Hence my suggesting poppy seeds.....
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We've got a huge bag of poppy seeds in the cupboard, which cost about £1.

 

My first million will be made by re-bagging it into tiny sachets, for sale at £5 (+ P&P) each, as 4mm scale horse droppings.

 

There are oodles of other seeds in the cupboard too, so I should be able to offer 7mm/ft and 10mm/ft too.

 

Miwyons, Rodney, we'll make miwyons.

 

K

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Had a lovely morning at our son's House chapel service.  It is some years since I have belted out "I vow to thee my country ..." and "Onward Christian Soldiers ..." with gusto, loudly and flat, as I do.

 

This afternoon, in between entertaining the dogs, I managed some modelling whilst the rest of the family went to play with horses (they have their uses, horses).

 

So I have added moulding to the ends of the WNR 4-wheel Third.  I built another Airfix/Dapol Brake Van chassis and brought a First-Second Composite up to the same stage.

 

Pondering the bodies of the Airfix/Dapol Brake Van kit, I thought I would use them to knock up a little "Goods Break" for the WNR. I hope it will pass muster as a suitable vehicle for the WNR.  I have ordered some Comet 'W' Irons for this and some other planned wagons.

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