While weather in the South Downs has been rather mixed lately, on Saturday we were treated to a morning of sunshine, spread across the hills like marmalade on toast. This was fortunate, as today had been chosen for a group of volunteers to work on our ancient crop field. Situated behind the Roman villa, most of the plot is already swaying with barley, oats, emmer wheat and Celtic bean plants blushing with pink flowers. The last remaining section had been rotavated shortly before and was ready to be sown, and a menacing army of pheasants had already started forming beyond the fence, keen to indulge in a seeded feast…
After a quick demonstration of the different tools, we took up the roles of ancient farmers. Some of us used the furrowing hoe to create grooves in the soil; some sprinkled seeds and beans into these grooves; some followed behind in small shuffling steps to flatten the soil over the seeds – this is all we can do to protect our seedlings from the pheasants’ insatiable hunger.
With a little hard work and a few rays of vitamin D, we had soon finished planting several rows of lovely crops. Our efforts were then rewarded with ‘authentic’ chocolate chip cookies and coffee, and a hot lunch of baked potatoes cooked over the roundhouse fire. It was a morning well spent, and hopefully our Beltain celebrations impressed the gods enough to grant us a large yield later in the year!
