Tales from the Farm by Amanda Owen

Author:Amanda Owen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Books

MAY 2020

Now this is going to be a strange column to write as, since the last article, life as we know it has changed drastically and not in a good way. It would be absolute folly for me not to mention the global coronavirus pandemic that is sweeping across the world, now cutting a swathe through our nation. So, what is happening in this green and pleasant land that we hold dear to our hearts?

It is now alive with birdsong and fresh green shoots of herbage. In the copses, upon the breeze, wafts the smell of fresh hawthorn blossom. On the tops, where frozen parcels of snow remain under shadowy crags and the windswept plateaus of countless moors stretch out for as far as the eye can see, there is an ill-wind, a sense of disquiet in this splendid isolation. In essence, nothing has changed here other than my perception of what is an enduring picture.

Of course, it’s early days with the social distancing. It’s relatively easy to keep yourself to yourself at Ravenseat, so I am counting my blessings, fortunate to live on what is often billed as one of the highest, remotest farms in England. My vocation as a shepherdess is one of mostly solitude . . . plenty of opportunity to think, wonder and contemplate. Sometimes it’s ‘I wonder why that sheep over there is limping or tifting’, or generally doing something that it should not. At other times it is the bigger picture. Thoughts on the latter could be dark, doom-laden, apocalyptic, were I not so stupendously lucky to live in a ‘notspot’: a place with no mobile signal, where I cannot be bombarded with news flashes, headlines and breaking bulletins. But the best blessing of all, therapeutic and refreshing, is to be in the company of the children. Where once I had just two at home, with the rest at school or university, now I have nine! It is fair to say that it is chaos, total bedlam. There are, at this time of year, innumerable tasks to be undertaken on the farm, so there is plenty to keep everyone amused. We are still lambing; there are sheep in the barns, in the fields and at the moor; and the cows are still laid in. Everyone has their own responsibilities, which vary according to age: feeding calves or pet lambs, collecting eggs, mucking out stables. And that is just for starters, because in amongst all this, there’s schoolwork to contend with.

In and out of the farmhouse they go, all day; you can tell roughly how many are inside by how many wellies are kicked off on the doorstep. Branches are dragged up from the woodshed to keep the home-fire burning, the terriers coming to and fro as they please, and I’ve lost count of the number of times I have opened the door only to meet a chicken making a rapid exit. Thirteen-year-old Miles even discovered a hen in the downstairs toilet. He removed her, but only after hearing her celebratory squawk telling us that she had produced an egg.

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