Archers thread #160: Ram a lamb a ding dong! To rate the mass wisteria in Ambridge, tap the feedback tablet here.

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Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads.

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For newer listeners, lurkers or those who just have no idea what we're talking about, @DadDadDad has created this useful thread: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3557323-For-Archers-fans-a-guide-to-acronyms-on-the-long-running-discussion-threads-and-any-other-meta-thread-questions-you-may-have - BOOP point for him! (See thread for explanation.)

Thanks to @MerryChristmasToYou, @OverArmour and @LillianGish for the thread title ideas.

This week is a bit better than last week, but the Brad/Adil/Lily stuff is very odd. Coming up to the anniversary of Jennifer's death (22nd January last year). We need a new matriarch - could that be Natasha? I find her quite an interesting character. Sometimes she's awful and then she has moments as last night where she utterly redeems herself.

Over to you!

And Tracy could have consulted with the groundsman and then convened a meeting of the cricket club to consider the matter. Ed only wants the place for a week, and I don't suppose that could have happened as quickly as would be needed.

Where is the cricket pitch? The village one near where I grew up was overlooked by one of the pubs and it was - perhaps unsurprisingly - quite central to the village. There would be no way that dozens of sheep wouldn’t be noticed. Not least because, without a fence, the buggers would be all over the road.

I don’t agree that the Ed story line is classist, it’s just emblematic of people who think they can try and pull a fast one then whine like hell when it bites them on the arse. If the Grundies played by the rules they wouldn’t have the problems they do, from Joe losing his tenant farmer status and ultimately the farm, to Ed dealing dodgy chemicals for easy money.

The sheep on the cricket pitch will end in tears. You can’t just fly graze willynilly and if they weren’t running shy of finding Grundy sheep still on their land at Easter (complete with endless excuses and blustering from Eddie), someone would have helped them out.

Fuck sake Ed, put a post on social media looking for the grazing like the rest of us serfs!

BrightYellowDaffodil
Where is the cricket pitch? The village one near where I grew up was overlooked by one of the pubs and it was - perhaps unsurprisingly - quite central to the village. There would be no way that dozens of sheep wouldn’t be noticed. Not least because, without a fence, the buggers would be all over the road.

The cricket ground is quite a bit to the north of the village proper, off the road to the bypass. However, Ed, Eddie and Brad would have had to shepherd their little flock from the bridge over the Am by the churchyard and through the entire village, pretty-much, in order to get them from Grange Farm to their destination, and I don't believe that the only person out and about in the middle of the afternoon would have been Jim Lloyd: they would have gone past the shop, the pub, the pond and the playground.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/staticarchive/898d13d95d31bf27bf10c555a8ff0b2f1858a395.jpg

Equally as bad was the Susan, Clarrie and Adam stuff. I thought the actual dialogue was quite well written, but the conversations they were having were totally nonsensical, if you see the difference.

I could almost picture the smug faces of the SWs at having given us such a dual laughter fest. Those yokels, eh? Always good for a bit of farce

Those yokels, eh? Always good for a bit of farce

Quite. It’s been a bloody dire week so far, imo. On the bright side - this is my prediction and nowt to do with spoilers - they are setting up a slow burn for Clarrie having some kind of major breakdown. So that’s something to look forward to. Too much to ask that she run amok and drown Susan in a bucket of yoghurt, I fear 🪣 🪦

They were talking about putting up (temporary) netting fencing in the episode, I thought? I imagine they took them in a livestock trailer to a certain point but had to go through the churchyard(!) to reach the cricket field.

I did enjoy the mention of a Ram Lamb in the episode, making me think of our thread title 😀

Also a small boop for mention of current events from Alice (or Kate? But I think it was Alice) - a lot of us are finding the news covering two wars hard to watch, it was good that they mentioned it.

A 100m x 110m plot of land is miniscule for a stables business! Google helped me with the conversion, its a hectare or 2.4 and a bit acres. A standard small sized schooling arena is 20 x 40m, so it would be 2.5(ish) lengths of a small arena, to include said arena + stables + turnout fields + parking + office/tackroom/storage for hay and bedding and horsebox/trailer parking AND the fabled fantastic upgraded XC course. That's properly nuts! Plus welfare guidelines are 1-1.5 acres turnout per horse or pony. It's going to have to be one of those livery yard with tiny postage stamp paddocks per horse and no turnout in winter due to trashed fields. 🤨

I've also never understood fully what the stables is supposed to be - is it livery only or a riding school too? They seem to be able to give anybody who wants one a lesson, which suggests riding school, but everything else points to high end private full livery yard.

I don't think - it's just the outfield they were talking about, rather than the middle bit with stumps at either end, isn't it? I assume it is less carefully managed there. And more pertinently, so do the Grundys, which us where it's all going to go wrong.

I imagine they took them in a livestock trailer to a certain point but had to go through the churchyard(!) to reach the cricket field.

There were nearly 100 of them, weren't they? They must have walked. Can anyone shed any light on the route they would have taken? (Yes, I know the topography of Ambridge is somewhat fluid.) Wouldn't someone notice the now empty field and ask Ed where his sheep had gone? (although distant bleating from the cricket field might just give them a clue)

Adam is sounding so perky these days, I wonder if being manager of Home Farm (?) sucked out all his energy and he's happier in organics.

We have a number of sport fields near me which are grazed in winter. The crease might be protected but the rest is grazing (and sometimes flooded) during winter, then fenced off in Spring/Summer

The cricket pitch in our town can be seen from two major roads. But im sure nobody whould take any notice of sheep on there as there is common ground near and they always have the odd horses or cows grazing in them.
I too remember Justin interfering in the stables and when he and Lilian were going to buy a boat and a woman who sounded like Fenella Fielding( from carry on screaming) knew Lilian. That was quite dire too.
Grundy story line again rubbish but like the sound of the sheep reminding us its a everyday story of simple country folk.
And I agree Carrie should drown Susan in a vat of hot yogurt.

There's a churchyard up Weardale that has sheep, and a sign saying there are there to be lawn mowers, but maybe they aren't there for long! Wouldn't 100 sheep need 100 acres?

I’m saying nothing …

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0115a196-1845-4145-bcbb-0b8879ff9882?shareToken=5bf64c2dafc20779ead4b98ee924d900

Presumably with permission though.

What’s Susan’s plan? I first thought she was setting up Adam by suggesting changes that H will be furious about on her return. But then she was suddenly up for a Works Night Out with her new boss so may be that’s not what’s happening. Poor Clarrie being steam-rollered into a jolly Burns Night when she feels so knackered and strung out.

Incidentally, how long is H going to be away for? It surely can’t be longer than just a few days but the way Adam is acting you would think she’s going backpacking round the world on a year-long trip!

I think Susan is trying to wangle a management role and bring in her own ideas. She said Clarrie could manage the yoghurt buckets on her own (or something) and she could help Adam with admin.

And marketing. And the newsletter.

Seemed late for a funeral. I don’t think I’ve ever been to a funeral in an afternoon 🤔.

Much as I love proper cheese (we have our own version of Borsetshire Blue made locally, and it’s AMAZING) I’m also partial to plastic cheese. Those singles in the wrapper? Cheese strings? Bring ‘em on.

Susan’s endless managerial ambitions get right on my tits, not least because they usually involve lording it over poor old Clarrie. I hope Helen slaps her down (or just slaps her…).

And yes, the timing of the funeral seemed odd. If it was dark enough that the sheep were being moved under the cover of late dusk, that’s nearly 5pm now.

Singles in (horrible, guilt inducing plastic) on white squishy additive laden bread.

Perhaps I'm nigella after all.

(Edited: well, taken out of the plastic.)

They have painted marks too, don’t they? So you can tell at a hundred paces whose sheep has got into your field. Everyone where I volunteer (upland sheep area) knows which marks correspond to which farmer

surely cricket fields aren't fenced They said something about putting some sort of fence up. But I thought that was to protect the wicket.

Do the scriptwriters imagine that rural sports fields are just left empty and unmanaged when not actually being played on. Ours has a lot of work on the wicket area over the winter, but the outfield is left to its own devices. Season starts end April - the grass has barely started into growth by then, so a single mow suffices. If something has been mown all summer, there won’t be any nettles.

Of course, if something’s been mown all summer, there won’t be much grass growth for the sheep.

If the Grundies played by the rules they wouldn’t have the problems they do, from Joe losing his tenant farmer status and ultimately the farm, to Ed dealing dodgy chemicals for easy money. Not much different from Brian accepting toxic waste as landfill on his land. Of course, he did lose his house - but the difference is that family wealth means he can absorb that without the devastating effect it would have on the Grundies.

Wouldn't 100 sheep need 100 acres? Isn’t that a figure for permanent year round stocking? You only have to look at a field of sheep to realise they don’t have an acre each - the rest of the 100 acres are all those empty fields growing grass to be used later on.

they are setting up a slow burn for Clarrie having some kind of major breakdown That would be really interesting. It would demonstrate how much depends on almost invisible Clarrie.

I don't know if anybody else has listened to the omnibus from 1983 I linked to yesterday, but it was actually very interesting listening to Clarrie and Eddie in the very early days of their marriage. William was a baby and Clarrie was feeling extremely insecure about Eddie's affections. He was trying to flirt with Susan, who was working in The Bull (and not reciprocating in any way), and who Clarrie hardly seemed to know at that time. Clarrie made several references to how much younger Susan was and when others remarked on Susan's attractiveness Clarrie was audibly put out and critical of both Susan's looks and the Horrobins as a family. There was a good line where Clarrie said that all the Horrobins were jailbirds and someone else (Tom, I think) said something like 'Only the boys! And I don't think Keith's in prison'.

I can't remember if all this was before or after a similar storyline involving Jolene, who at that time was silent. She found her voice when she got involved with Sid, IIRC.

Anyway, poor old Clarrie has always been portrayed as a workhorse, always doing her duty by her nearest and dearest but mostly taken for granted. Pathetically grateful for the rare displays of affection and gratitude she gets from Eddie and the boys. Extremely insecure about her weight and her looks (this last, maybe a bit less now she's nearly 70*). If she were to die or develop a serious illness or disability, the Grundy clan would be absolutely at sea, as mentioned above.

*Clarrie was born on 12th May 1954, according to the BBC, so a big birthday is imminent. I hope the family do her proud.

I'm very confused about the sheep shenanigans. Are all 40 acres so completely underwater that they can't find a couple of acres to put them for a few weeks? I'm finding that hard to believe. And why did they need Brad to help move them? If the 100 head include the ewes that are currently/recently lambing (as well as last year's mysteriously unsold lambs), wouldn't most of the ewes currently be in the lambing shed anyways, as the oldest of the lambs will only be about 3 weeks old? Ok, my reference point is Scottish sheep, but the farmers I know keep them in the sheds for a number of weeks---especially the January lambs!

And straying off to eat flowers. I’m in the Pennines and there ain’t a flower to be seen.