RANSOMES CRAWLER

Way back, when I used to spend my summer holidays with my grandparents in deepest darkest Essex, some of the smallholders used beautiful little tank-like tractors called Ransomes Crawlers. As I remember they were low to the ground, they had caterpillar type tracks, and they were painted red and green. If you think... sort of Meccano come Dinky Toy, with just a little bit of 1944 military tank thrown in for good measure... then you will have it about right. But anyway, Ive got a feeling that the best way to sort my heavy moving,digging and dragging activities would be to get such a machine.
Is there anyone out there who can help?

QUAD BIKE v OLD GREY FERGUSON TRACTOR

The question that we have been asking ourselves of late is... should we get a farm quad bike or.. should we stay with our old Grey Ferguson Tractor?

THOUGHTS - PROS & CONS
* A quad bike would be very useful for hauling a small trailer
* A quad bike would be good for Gill - easy to drive and manage
* A quad bike would perhaps be easier to reverse than the tractor
* We could use a quad bike to transport the deliveries of manure from the main gate down to the veg garden
* A road legal bike could be used to bring stuff from neighbouring farms
* A new quad would be an added expense - not very Green.
* I see that a good second hand quad bike would cost about as much as a good second hand tractor - and then again we already have the tractor
* A quad bike would be yet another lump of machinery
* I have very little experience of a quad
* Our Tractor is a beautiful machine - not very dynamic maybe, but rock solid reliable
* Our tractor is amazingly easy to service - lots of big bolt on lumps
* Our old tractor is gaining in value... worth more now than when we bought it

As you can see... it all needs thinking about.

Do you have any thoughts out there?

They may look cute...!

ARE GEESE SELF-SUFFICIENT?
If you have a patch of grass – something like an overgrown orchard – and plenty of kitchen scraps, then geese can manage for most of the year without extra feeding. As William Cobbett says in his now classic self-sufficiency book Cottage Economy (published 1821) …”Geese are amongst the hardiest animals in the world… a goose will lay a hundred eggs a year… we give such things that are going to seed…lettuce… cabbages…they thrive exceedingly upon this food.”