I'd have gotten away with it if it wasn't for that pesky kid.
One summer my mates and I decided to build a den in a haystack. We totally aced this one. It had secret rooms, tunnels and all the mod-cons that a hay-den can have. Proud of our achievements we invited a few of the outsiders to have a look at our handiwork but they weren't skilled in the stealthy ways of den building and we soon got rumbled by a farmhand. I watched from the safety of one of the secret rooms as my friends were lined up against a wall and given a good talking-to.

Something was muttered, one of my 'friends' pointed at the barn.

"And you can come out too you little shit. If you don't come out immediately this will end badly." Said the farmhand looking directly at my hidey-hole. I held firm for at least 5 seconds before shamefully joining the ass-kicking line.

I'm not proud of the next bit but she told us that we'd have to wait until the farmer came back for a proper kicking as we'd caused a lot of money's worth of damage to the bales.
This would be very bad news as the farmer knew my dad. There was only one thing for it. I cried, begged and pleaded - tears so convincing that the farmhand took pity and let us scarper.

"Nice one Airman Gabber! Great acting."
"It was easy. I'm good at drama lessons."

I wasn't acting.
( Airman Gabber Living life like a 70's BBC presenter, Fri 19 Oct 2012, 11:57, 2 replies)

I used to do this with my cousin
They used to tell us that big stacks of bales straight after harvest are a bad thing because they'll be slightly damp, and in big piles the heat that is generated by the natural bacteria beginning the process of decay can cause the whole stack to catch fire.
Which is clearly bollocks, because nowadays the bales themselves are the size of the castles etc. we used to build from the smaller bales of the 1970s.
Mostly, it turned out, it was because they couldn't load them on the trailers as easily and had to stop, which took time and energy. Less because they're lazy than because it was their busiest time of year and they were knackered to begin with.
Now they use bales fifty times the size and specialist handling equipment - the extra cost of having to buy all that outweighs what they used to have to pay farmhands to do it all by muscle. And the extra they had to pay them to demolish den built by local kids.
( shinyshinyscalp less a man, more a way of life, Fri 19 Oct 2012, 14:48, closed)

I got rumbled by a farmhand, once.
He loved to look at my hidey-hole.
( monster munch person, man, woman... camera... TV?, Fri 19 Oct 2012, 16:33, closed)