Pleasant sight

When Franz calls in the autumn to say he is coming over to collect our horse muck, it is a good sign, meaning he has got his maize silage done.

Although it has been mainly dry, the fog last week, lack of a drying wind and the weak sunshine means the fields are "greasy" on top and the tractors bring quite a lot of muck on the road. The farmers are responsible for cleaning up and would be held responsible for any accidents which may result. Being a "100%'er" he put out a red warning triangle while he was bringing the harvest home yesterday evening and before the main cleaning work was done. Incredibly someone took the trouble to steal it!

Not only am I pleased to see the muck gone, it's nice to get the countryside "back". It was very noticeable last Sunday as we headed south of Ottobeuren that the countryside there with virtually no maize grown, looks so much more attractive. Price we have to pay for wanting cheap food.

(Last night on TV was a interesting documentary where someone tried to take a balanced view on chicken meat production, working and filming in a convential industrial chicken farm and at the same time raising a batch of 2500 "organic" chickens and then trying to sell the meat. His packaged meat cost almost 10 times that in the supermarkets. Very good particularly as he didn't knock the conventional industry and wasn't against meat production as such but left the viewer to make their own judgement. A bit like the well known Bavarian "star cook", Alfons S. who often says we are prepared to pay 10 Euros a liter for the oil we put in our cars but grap Aldi's offer for 99 cents/liter for our cooking/salad oil)

Not sure if it's common in the UK but here often the case that certain machines that are seldom needed by one farmer alone, are purchased by one farmer and then offered to others for a "per use" fee, This is the case with this large muck spreader and while it tends to be specialised expensive machines , it can also be small items such as a round bale carryer which costs one Euro per carried bale, the muck spreader 14 Euros per load. System is called "Maschinenring" (Machinery Syndicate) which not only covers equipment but also services, eg holiday or sickness help or removal of trees etc.

With the usual perfection, Franz and son Markus had the muck spreader loaded. The autumn heap is relatively small as the horses spend most of their time outdoors, so little straw bedding. Thanks guys.