The Farming Thing — A Layman's Guide To Farming by Reverend Stuart Wilson.

IT IS said that one is 'nearer to God in a garden than anywhere else on earth' —however, the Rev Stuart Wilson might well argue that the Lord's hand is to be found similarly on a farm.

Indeed, few people are as well qualified to evaluate the union of nature and nurture as he.

For 43 years he was directly involved in the farming industry — largely in West Devon —being, among other things, a sales representative, an accounts manager and truly at the 'sharp end' , for a couple of years a farm manager.

In his 50th year he was ordained as an un paid curate in Okehampton and is now team vicar to the same town. Clearly a busy man, Stuart Wilson has still found time to write a book 'simply to try and help those who are innocent to the pastime of farming and find it difficult to understand the simplest aspects as well as some of the great countryside traditions that seem to be at total odds with their lifestyles'.

In this he has succeeded — and in much more, also.

For this publication of 107 pages —beautifully presented with numerous coloured photos of high quality — is an eclectic and rich amalgam of tradition, information, opinion, observation and manual.

Cattle, sheep, pigs —indeed, poultry — are covered; their purpose, their husbandry, their respective qualities, the pests and diseases which afflict them — often there is also reference to their local importance.

The author covers the relative merits of organic and traditional farming with rare perception and a refreshing absence of dogma.

Soil and land management are examined, with the crucial influence of quality and climate explained; there is comprehensive coverage of crops, their sowing, harvesting, the problems and diseases along the way.

There is also a chapter which goes beyond farming to more general countryside matters, such as care and maintenance of woodlands, ancient and modern, a prime example being that which surrounds Okehampton Castle, of their relevance and of the destruction in recent times of very English deciduous woodland, to be replaced, when replaced at all, by less desirable, but economically more rewarding, conifers.

The most crucial revelation concerning finance in farming, however, is made early on in the book, tersely but effectively.

For the shameful neglect of the agricultural industry throughout the land over the past quarter century means that less than a third of the nation's food is home-grown; if given financial and cultural encouragement to do so, our farmers could produce probably 75% or more of domestic food requirements.

This publication is written with understanding and compassion, but eschews those twin mischief makers —sentimentality and nostalgia. Stuart Wilson writes with lucidity, knowledge and affection; it is a book to read, re-read — and prize.

'The Farming Thing - A Layman's Guide to Farming,' priced at £6, is available from the author on 01837 871248

or e-mail [email protected]">[email protected] with all profits being donated to FCN (Farm Crisis Network), RABI (Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution) and the Arthur Rank Centre.

Ted Sherrell