It’s called The Scything Handbook. Author Ian Miller is based on a small homestead in Iowa. The American publishers of the book, New Society say: “Written by a master of the scythe, professionally trained in Austria, and drawing deeply on research into original German texts, The Scything Handbook brings centuries-old
Water at the Trust comes from a spring on the land. The spring is below the main areas of water usage, so is pumped up to storage tanks in the Red Barn using a ram pump. We store the water in second-hand IBC tanks which were previously used to contain
In autumn the scythe moves from harvesting grass to bracken, a task to which it is well suited. We harvest the bracken both to control it in the fields and to use it as a resource on the farm and garden. These two posts about the 2014 bracken harvest and
We started bringing in hay on Saturday, and bought in more Sunday. With tonight’s hauling, we have quarter of an acre of herb rich hay safe in the barn. Hay spread in the sun. The most recently mown at the top, down to hay ready to cart at the bottom
We have a grass track running through the Trust. We maintain parts of it with a scythe, usually using the clippings to mulch the vegetable gardens. The edges to the tracks are left to grow longer and bramble tries to creep out from the hedges. Periodically the edges need managing
Spring, the grass is growing and it is time to bash the mole hills. This period of dry sunny weather has made the mole hills friable and easy to spread, so I have been out in the hay field armed with a rake and doing just that. While raking, I
March has been a busy month for us. After a lot of waiting and planning, we went up to the Faroe Islands. The recent eclipse provided the perfect motivation to get us to a place we have long wanted to visit. The farm museum at Saksun, Faroe Islands, with the