Farmers and Combines
Not all farmers are uncaring when it comes to livestock and wildlife.

A friend of mine was combining a field of wheat a couple of harvests back when he saw a pheasant hen running in front of the combine.

He slowed down and hoped that she would run to the side away from the header which was rolling ever closer towards her, but she didn't.

He came to a stop, and still she wasn't moving off. At this point he suspected there was a good reason for her not wishing to move out of the way of a giant Claas Lexion monster...


He jumped out of the cab and went to investigate....

There in the wheat was a small nest of pheasant chicks, barely a day or two old, each tweeting, mouths open and angled up towards the gently swaying crop and the blue sky above.

Their mother, even more scared and protective of her offspring was squawking at K, the farmer.

Knowing that these birds were in line for certain death if he left them there, K carefully lifted the rough pheasant nest and slowly walked to the edge of the field.

Once there he placed them and their home in some long grass on the verge and stepped back hoping that their mother would see it was safe and reclaim her babies.

All appeared to go well, the pheasant hen trotted over and sorted out her brood.

K got back into his combine and continued to harvest the field.


He thought no more of his small act of kindness until his wife came at lunchtime to join him with a picnic lunch.

In a 4x4.

She drove across the field to get to him.

She didn't know there was anything in the long grass on the verge.

She didn't understand why he didn't want to eat a piece of cold game pie.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 12:56, 8 replies)

oh dear
poor little bastards, but I guess that's life on a farm.
( Firkinfedup last shat on your wife's tits at, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 13:00, closed)

True, it is life on a farm, or in the countryside
And the chances are that those poor little birds would have met with a sticky end anyway in the shape of either a fox, badger, gun or a speeding car.

Actually this is just one of the reasons that farmers have quite a high suicide rate (along with Doctors and Vets apparently) - because they are used to seeing life and death on an almost daily basis...added to which all of those professions have ready access to the necessary equipment for topping oneself.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 13:06, closed)

A similar thing happened
a few hundred years ago to a farmhand in Ayrshire, only it was a mouse's nest he disturbed:

"Wee sleekit, cow'rin' timorous beastie..."
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 13:22, closed)

Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie
But that was winter and a plough.

But also, that's life in the raw.

And also rather similar to Wylie Coyote and Roadrunner.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 13:27, closed)

Burns
Yes, it was indeed. But in my defence I don't think Claas were making combines in 1785. Even John Deere was but a twinkle in his great-great-great grandfather's eye!
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 13:32, closed)

To give him credit
at least he tried.
(TDub Nunc id vides, nunc ne vides on, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 14:49, closed)

i worked at the claas mans factory for a bit
grinding bits off galvaniased trunion blocks.

*clicks*
(magictorch, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 16:09, closed)

You just can't beat
a Claas...by comparison even the newest John Deere or New Holland just looks crap.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 16:57, closed)