Archived News

28th September 2009

Surrey County Agricultural Society (SCAS) had fabulous weather for their Ploughing Match and Country Fair at Loseley yesterday.  Laurence has been a SCAS steward for thirty years, working at the Surrey County Show and the Agricultural Society’s annual ploughing match.

As ploughing match steward, Laurence will take two judges to view all the competitors in the ‘Conventional Classes’ whilst other stewards take care of two other classes.  Each competitor has an hour for their ‘openings’ which is then judged, three hours to plough and finish and throughout that time the judges watch how the ploughmen work. Laurence is on hand to deal with any problems. He ensures the results are taken to the Agricultural Society Secretary at the end of the competition, in readiness for prize-giving.

Surrey farmers can choose to enter their crops into the annual ‘crops classes’.  The crops are judged by farmers from other counties during the summer; they inspect a variety of crops in the different classes, awarding 1^st-3rd place for each.  At the end of the day the judges also decide upon the most outstanding crop seen.

Amongst Laurence’s entries this year were two separate fields of oil seed rape, for which he received certificates for 1^st and 2^nd place; these come as a nice surprise in the post at the end of summer.

Various cups are presented at the SCAS Ploughing Match.  This year E.D.G. Matthews & Sons won the Attlee Perpetual Challenge Cup for ‘The Most Outstanding Crop’.  Laurence won this award for his 1^st place field of oil seed rape at Park Farm. (Thanks to Jane Garrett for this photo)

George and Christopher tried to convince me to buy some ducklings at the country fair but I managed to sidle off to look at the vintage tractors instead.  Christopher found one that would suit him perfectly!

We kept seven piglets as fatteners, from our first two litters back in spring.  The Magnificent Seven were collected by lorry and taken to the abattoir today.  The resultant pork will be home-grown and additive free.

As timing would have it, I am attending a pork butchery course over the next couple of days, followed by bacon and gammon curing next month.