Clarkson’s Farm season 5

[Soubriquet]

apologies is there is another thread, I did look but couldn’t see.

Anyway, season 5 has dropped today, and whether you like Jeremy or not, he does highlight most how difficult it is to be a farmer in this day and age

Agree, he’s brought farming into people’s homes, some people who probably never realised what goes into getting food on our tables.

I agree. Before watching this, I never really thought about farming. I would bitch about the weather being too hot cos I hate the heat, but never thought about the effect on crops.

I have learned so much

I love Lisa even more this series, she’s hilarious with her sheep and snails. Looked mega pissed when they were served up in the pub. I thought she was absolutely brilliant helping with the harvest too.

I can’t believe how heartbreaking farming is. That poor baby cow being put to sleep had me in tears.

I don’t understand why they didn’t bring another manager in, but with such tight margins on everything I suppose it’s showing you have to all pitch in and help out. Lisa did well and Charlie and Kaleb were very respectful towards her too.

Me too ! I have loved all the of it and it’s taught me a lot. The seasons are changing and affecting our food.

I honestly think this is such an informative series. I can see a campaign now for changes to TB testing.

There has to be. Sad to see Jeremy's instinct was right 😞

Not sure why anyone would want to do any farming to be honest. He made a loss and it was a lot worse than last year as well. How do people manage to do anything up against so much?

I do wonder how farmers manage.

I mean the equipment, the seed, the fertiliser and everything else costs an absolute fortune, and then in the end the yield of the crops is not high

How are they managing to survive?!

And then the govt takes it all away

Why do the government take it away ? Just any profits are taxed ? Or the new IHT taxes ?.

They seem to get some subsidies. Lots of farmers did vote for Brexit , that has affected things ( whatever your view is on that , it didn’t help matters)
I know it’s complex though.

They can’t leave their farms to their families and hen they die .

I thought Kaleb's reactions to Jeremy being ill were very sweet. He was clearly gutted and worried for his friend, then delighted to get him back. That brought a small tear to my eye.

Gutting re the cow - Jeremy had a point re haphazardness.

I think that the two men were quite pragmatic at first , but clearly Kaleb missed him a lot. They have a big bond with each other despite all the ribbing and swearing!
I did like the sketches of the birds , how sweet was that. Hannah is lovely. Dh isn’t that keen on this programme really, but he was impressed by her! She knows her bird song.

Did he make a loss because he spent a fortune in the agbot tractor? That would have been a massive lump sum spent which would have been in the outgoings column? You could argue whether it was needed or not, most farms don’t have one. But even if you can argue that long term it will be worth having it, it’s still a one off cost which won’t be there next year??

It was leased no th bits of kit were and I’d imagine the publicity from the programme meant he paid very little

I queried the buying of some the fancy equipment and I think it was on lease ( he mentioned lease to Charlie today ) or maybe just lent to them.
Still a lot of money though.
It wasn’t made clear , but I’m not sure how that works with a lease deal.

But the agbot can run 24/7

In theory 3 farms can share one ?

Also, it's worth noting how much time the robot kit freed up for other jobs.

My brother used to be a farm manager. It's blooming hard. You can be really skilled and work really hard then one late frost wrecks a crop. I don't like Clarkson but I do like this programme because it shows how hard farming is.

I completely get that, I grew up on a farm. I’m not disputing the benefit of it from a time saving pov. But ultimately you have to calculate if the farm can afford such a big expenditure or just carry on with traditional tractors, etc. maybe he did lease it/get a cheap deal for publicity.

Other farmers can rent it complete with a technician. I think Kaleb does contract farming anyway.

You don’t put a big one-off purchase against a single year’s profit. It’s a capital item, it would go on the balance sheet, and an allowance set against (say) the next 10 years’ profits as depreciation. So the cost is spread

Richard Ham is still around, and he's got a little friend - thank goodness they decided they couldn't get rid of him!

Well that was depressing.

I've definitely learned a lot from Clarkson's farm but I think it's important to remember he's very good at presenting things the way he wants them to appear.

Despite his insistence that it's impossible for farmers to make a living, I've yet to meet a poor farmer, and I live next door to a farm.

And don't forget that the inheritance tax change was exactly because of people like him, who openly admitted that he bought a farm to dodge IHT.

Because we love it. It's our life, all we know, our crops, animals, land,
We are the carers of the land and we want to provide food for people from it.