I WAS trying the other day to remember how many corn harvests I had taken part in before coming to farm up in the hills. My conclusion was eight. The combine harvester came in the year after I left and by coincidence barley came in where I lived at the same time as the combine. Before then it was all oats with the exception of one field of wheat and as it was all grown for stock feed, it was consumed on the farm.

We used to build stacks mainly in the stackyard by the farm buildings but occasionally we built some in the field. I believe I have mentioned before that we thatched the stacks with reeds cut from the ditches using a long pole scythe.

Nothing was ever done without a reason. A small stack was built after being carefully measured out to give half a day's threshing, a stack double the size would of course mean a full days threshing.

For pulling the thresher and baler (for the straw), our contractor first used what was known as an Old Fordson. That did not mean it was an old tractor, that was the model. They were not very big but the fact they could pull a thresher and baler to the site and then could provide the power to drive both machines at once from their pulley, was testament to how powerful they really were. Also you did not have to clamber up onto the seat as you have to do with most of today's tractors. You simply stepped onto the footplate at the rear which was only about a foot from the ground.

The Old Fordson could easily manoeuvre the thresher and baler into the required position and once the main belt was fixed on to the pulley you were ready for off.

Before the days of the wheeled tractor, they could need as many as a shaft horse plus six pairs of horses to get the thresher into position and ready for the traction engine if the ground conditions were bad. I never saw this done, but I have seen pictures of the 13 in-hand ready hooked up.

Much has been written lately about the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy and decoupling payment away from production. I have written before about how French Agriculture Ministers go in to bat for their farmers. Twas ever thus, and it is no different now.

It would be churlish of me if I did not accept that quite a lot of people are relieved that Margaret Beckett has now agreed to the three-way division of England for payment instead of the original two-way which would have been a disaster. The three-way split was put forward by the National Farmers' Union, the Country Land Business Association and several others. It is better than the Defra split but I believe it now comes under making the best of a bad job'.

My colours are nailed firmly to the mast. I supported what is called the historical route, the same route that has been accepted for Scotland and Wales with whom we share borders. What is wrong with seeking to be treated like the rest of the United Kingdom?

The question may well be asked "Why am I not supporting the position of my union? The answer is "I am". The historic route was the policy of the NFU but when Beckett said no, they then pursued the three-way while I stuck to the historic route; in other words it wasn't me who changed his mind.

Next time I'll tell you how the French dealt with it.

Dialect word: Swarmel meaning to climb a rope.

Thought for the day: The successful man will profit from his mistakes and try again a different way.