NextBackSex on the farm was encouraged when Raymond bought a big red bull. This lived in the stable next to the main cowshed. Having a huge brass ring through its nose, it was only let out on high days and holidays to have its fun with Mrs moo-cow. The presence of the bull meant that there was a constant flow of calves, slimy trails of after birth, and rich blood infused milk, popularly known locally as bastings, which was hungrily and noisily sucked up by the bulging eyed newly born calf. The bull came to a sad end one day when some guy came and shot it! Probably finished up on the milk cart in suitable lumps, as rationing was still in force on everything except fresh air.
At one time chickens were hatched in a wooden shed adjacent to the cowshed in the yard Although housing the latest in galvanised incubating gadgets, this never appeared to be that successful. The shed eventually filled up with rubbish, rats, dust and spiders webs. Later when the two battery houses were added adjacent to the lane in field number 95, point of lay birds were bought in and used until every egg that could be squeezed from the poor bird had been extracted! In the latter years a few hundred free range birds were kept in moveable hen houses in field number 155 alongside the lane.
A number of marmalade coloured cats roamed the place, these being essential to keep the rat population, of which there were many, to a manageable level. These appeared completely wild and lived off the occasional bowl of food and the produce of their nightly hunting escapades. Go near them and they bared their teeth and hissed a warning, go nearer and their surgical claws would rip the very flesh from your arms!
