On the Farm

Our usual play kit comprised a couple of pairs of blue overalls with shoulder straps. Henry Pullen lived up the road, and for seven days each week, would stomp past our house at around 6.30am every morning on the way to the farm. A rugged little Salopian, born on the civilised side of the Welsh border, distinguished by an egg sized lump on his one cheek and bushy faded brown eyebrows. His sartorial elegance was always apparent in the well worn frayed brown cow-gown tied up with a double belt of binder twine. Thick rough grey flannel trousers both belted and bracered and black wellies with tops turned down, completed his flat footed gait. Every day was the same picture, every day the same white chipped billy-can filled with cold tea, a man of impeccable order and mundane reliability.

There were around 25 Ayrshire milking cows at any one time, which supplied a steady supply of milk and the usual calves, mostly sold on elsewhere with only the odd one kept to keep herd numbers up. For a time a bull was kept in the stall next to the cowshed. Around seven in the morning, Henry would amble up the lane to the where the cows were. After calling in the waiting cows whilst some distance away, the gates was opened and down they came to take their places in the cowsheds. The clanking of neck chains and the smell and dust of a measure of dirty green cow cake heralded the start of the draining of the cows 'sumps'. The battered old bucket, the voluminous cloth and the smell of the disinfectant filled the air as the udders were meticulously washed. The holding up of the swishing tail, the occasional trussing of the legs of a frisky enemy poised for the sudden unexpected kick up Henry's nuts! This was the twice a day ritual that framed the window of Henry's day.

There were three cow sheds. The biggest being a long old building of local red brick, whitewashed walls complete with cobwebs, and a concrete floor. The galvanised metal stall railings stood in front of the feeding trough into which Henry chucked a carefully guestimated quantity of cake. Further back was a channel, a couple of feet wide into which the bulk of the cows bilges was approximately jettisoned, (usually just when you walked past). Cow muck in the field is usually presented as a hard crusted pat constantly buzzed by nasty looking brown cow flies, but in the cowshed it is unusually warm, volatile, smelly and splatters everything within striking distance. Such was the charm of milking! The three Gascoigne milking machines with their spaghetti of red rubber tubes, constantly sucked and puffed with endless regularity. Up in the little lean-to by the dairy, the small electric -vacuum pump worked overtime to keep the milk flowing, the rubber hoses convulsing with each chuff. The spurts of warm milk burst in the sight glasses as the stainless buckets collected their load. Most of the cows would be finally stripped by hand, to wring out the last few cupfuls of the white reward. The three legged tubular stool was probably the most uncomfortable instrument of torture ever invented. With head firmly ensconced in the cow’s kidneys, the odd rebel would often lash out with its ungainly back leg, with you, the bucket and the stool finishing up in the dung channel, soaking up an uncomfortable cocktail of milk, dung and very hurt pride. Whilst the eruditious use of a piece of black hosepipe on the poor unfortunate cows buttock may have provided limited personal satisfaction, it never actually cured the problem. The summer heat was hatching time for the Warble fly. After making it's long journey from the cows legs it reappeared as a juicy pimple like insert in the cows back. It was with great personal delight that after being touched with a lighted cigarette, the offending pimple exploded with a loud bang and spewed its evil contents into the waiting world. Henry used to say that was how lace holes in shoes were invented!

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