Letters to the Editor - December 2009

In the late 1940s or early 1950s, I was given a copy of this masterpiece of English literature and agricultural advice, which was written in pencil on the back of an old invoice form.

Although I have tried over the years and as recently as August this year to find its provenance I have had no replies to my letters. I hope readers will find it entertaining and indeed educational, and wonder if anyone knows the author.

Ding Dung
Odes have been written and praises sung
To almost everything but dung.
But oh, what praise is high enough
For such rich, aromatic stuff?
Look at the barley’s drooping ear
And dream of mellow, dung-fed beer
See how the wheat springs shoulder high
When fed from stable, byre and sty
See how the mangel worzels swell
If you’re prepared to dung them well
So watch your … rolling by
With naked triumph in your eye
For no man spreadeth dung in vain
He giveth to receive again

Sylvia J Gurney, Milton Keynes

I was interested to read about Muscovy ducks, their origins and characteristics in Neville Turner’s article (Sept).

A local farm with a very pleasant tea room, which we frequently visit, has an assortment of ducks, geese, hens and peacocks enjoying free range around the paddocks and gardens. On a recent visit we found a party of eight Muscovy ducks busily scoffing Cotoneaster horizontalis berries from bushes growing up the walls of the house. While we watched they virtually stripped bare the lower three feet of the bushes and were stretching up as far as their necks would allow to pick off more berries.

For ducks to have such an appetite for hard berries struck me as rather strange, but I suppose they have a pretty catholic kind of diet and take whatever is available. It certainly provided us with an entertaining half hour watching their berry picking antics.
E Baldwin, Dumfries

Sussex pudding: I know how to eat it but don’t know how to make it. I haven’t had any for over twenty years and I wondered if any of your readers can help with the recipe.

Basically it was made with flour, baking powder and water, and boiled in a cloth, the finished product being shaped more like a humbug, roughly eight inches (20 cm) long and three inches (8 cm) round.

Sussex pudding was eaten with a main meal, in slices; pieces were eaten either dry or used as a gravy mopper-upper. Any slices left over were fried next morning for breakfast with bacon and egg.

My mother was taught the method by her mother-in-law but we have now lost the recipe. I hope someone can help us.
Mr & Mrs R F Wooberry, Bicester

The article ‘An apple a day keeps extinction away’ in the September issue, describing the apple varieties of north-west England, made me realise how zonal fruit cultivation can be.

I did not recognise any of the varieties listed. Eighty years ago in our south Gloucestershire orchard we grew: beauty of Bath, Worcester pearmain, Lord Derby, jacklabel (our local market gardener told us it was a French apple spelt Jacques La Belle), Cox’s orange, Blenheim orange, Elison’s Orange, Lord Lambourn, Ribston pippin, Morgan sweet and two kinds named locally for their shape and the way they grew — sheep’s nose and underleaves. I don’t remember a Bramley.

I left the property in 1939, and now the orchard has been built on and all the garden trees are gone.

We also grew plums and damsons. Do any Countryamn readers recall a plum called magnum bonum or a pear called jargonelle?
Jim Allen, Bristol

Imagine my delight on reading the letters from Sue Martin in the August issue, and Joy Haines-Croft in October, about the pond at Mill Hill, London.

The terrapins were after my time at Mill Hill. In the mid-1930s my friend and I used to walk up the hill with our little fishing nets and try to catch tiddlers. However, I was more fascinated by the beautiful blue dragonflies all over the pond.

I am unable to travel there now, so love to hear anything about my childhood haunts. Are there still ponds along Totteridge Lane?
Margaret Philpot, High Wycombe

I do enjoy reading The Countryman, especially Humphrey Phelps in the June issue about moles.

Although pests do destroy the bulbs and plants in my wild flower meadow, especially during the frosty weather, it isn’t very nice having to have the moles killed as their only crime is rebuilding their tunnels when they collapse and making the molehills.

I try to rescue the English bluebells exposed on top of the hills to replant later and I used to fill up rabbit holes. It is a costly service having moles caught and then experts aren’t always found.
H Wooldridge, Worcestershire

In the July issue of The Countryman you mentioned the scarcity of the black swan.

In September, in Stratford, Ontario, Canada, my husband and I watched two black swans enjoying the lake and lovely weather. They look similar to your picture — when they flapped their wings a few white feathers showed. Can this be the same swan
as mentioned in the July issue?

As always The Countryman brings monthly pleasure to our household.
Martha Innes, by email

Regarding the letter on your website from Henry Harris of Totnes, Devon, about black swans at Dawlish. I would not think black swans would ever pair with our mutes, though I might be wrong. However, this year a naturalised pair of black swans are to be seen on the Exe Estuary with two cygnets. The white patches Mr Harris commented on would be from the primary wing-feathers.
Stewart Beer, Barnstaple

With reference to the letter from Elisabeth Roberts (Oct).

Although she doesn’t say so in her letter, the squirrel seen killing a mouse was definitely a ‘grey import’. I just wish people would realise how ‘red in tooth and claw’ grey squirrels really are. They are not the cuddly vegetarians some people seem to think, but vicious omnivores, who will take songbird eggs and chicks without a second thought, and now it seems will even nab the odd mouse or two.

If you add to this the other nasty habit grey squirrels have of ringbarking trees (they are especially partial to beech bark) they are an all-round nasty piece of work, and should not be tolerated in our countryside. Take away the fluffy tail and you will see them for what they are — a tree rat.

The only hope of bringing back native red (vegetarian) squirrels lies in eliminating the grey invaders from the UK. Why societies like the RSPB are so tardy in calling for the culling of grey squirrels baffles me. They are up there with cats and magpies as ‘songbird enemy number one’.
Chris Smithy, by email

It would appear many pro-wind commentators are now recognising the public are becoming much more aware of the limitations and absurdity of large scale wind generation in the UK. Such that these so-called experts now use the generic term ‘renewables’ or refer to wind and tidal power at the same time, hoping (bless) to give wind generation some degree of credibility. For example, tidal schemes do not require backup by conventional power stations, as the tides are predictable and guaranteed. Whereas wind power (due to the very nature of the atmosphere) demands 90 per cent backup, otherwise the lights are going to go out... so it really is a no-brainer.

Government should call an immediate halt to the mindless proliferation of wind farms which are being subsidised by the public in their energy bills, bearing in mind wind farms also industrialise and despoil our beautiful and irreplaceable countryside... I do wonder sometimes if the inmates have truly taken over the asylum.
Dave Haskell, Boncath

We welcome readers' letters, which should be sent to:
Countryman, The Water Mill, Broughton Hall, Skipton, North Yorkshire BD23 3AG
Or email: editorial@thecountryman.co.uk

The editor reserves the right to edit letters for length and clarity.