The love of the countryside by the non rural public

I once found a massive extended Eastend family having a picnic in a field adjoining a footpath. They were loud, but nice people , so I told them they were off the path and couldn't stay where they were.

'Oh why love, we ain't doin' no 'arm and we'll pick up all the rubbish'

'No sorry you REALLY need to move because...'

'C'mon love we're all unpacked now and we had a helluva job getting Uncle Ted's wheelchair across the grass..'

The whole lot of them joined in pleading their case, I think there were eleven of them... they went on and on and on until finally I got a word in..

'But, we have a bull in this field, that's why we have a notice on the gate'

'Haha love, nice try. You ain't gonna scare us orf like like. Look, they are cows and they even have calves with them..'

So, I walked across the field , put my finger through the nose ring on the Lincoln Red bull and led him over to join the party (he was actually a real softy, but you can't take the chance pf getting sued)

'So,' I said, 'Is this a bull or is it bull****?'

Never seen anyone pack up and move all their food, plus Uncle Ted in his wheelchair into the 'proper' field, full of apologies and 'Don't you go letting go of him now.'

Very very funny and I was crying with laughter, they were so nice they even offerred me a cuppa and a slice of cake, bless them.
 
I remember being about 10 years old and my (suburban) school went on a residential trip to a farm. I think I realised then how different the life of someone with horses and animals is to those without. The screams when the girls saw a cow poo! They didn't even need to be near it, just seeing one set them off. I remember thinking 'its a farm for gods sake, what do you expect!' and happily traipsing on through the middle of the field. I once send a school friend into a complete meltdown when I picked up a solid horse poo pellet with my bare hands and chucked it on the muck heap. It a different world....
 
Ladyinred said:
I once found a massive extended Eastend family having a picnic in a field adjoining a footpath. They were loud, but nice people , so I told them they were off the path and couldn't stay where they were.

'Oh why love, we ain't doin' no 'arm and we'll pick up all the rubbish'

'No sorry you REALLY need to move because...'

'C'mon love we're all unpacked now and we had a helluva job getting Uncle Ted's wheelchair across the grass..'

The whole lot of them joined in pleading their case, I think there were eleven of them... they went on and on and on until finally I got a word in..

'But, we have a bull in this field, that's why we have a notice on the gate'

'Haha love, nice try. You ain't gonna scare us orf like like. Look, they are cows and they even have calves with them..'

So, I walked across the field , put my finger through the nose ring on the Lincoln Red bull and led him over to join the party (he was actually a real softy, but you can't take the chance pf getting sued)

'So,' I said, 'Is this a bull or is it bull****?'

Never seen anyone pack up and move all their food, plus Uncle Ted in his wheelchair into the 'proper' field, full of apologies and 'Don't you go letting go of him now.'

Very very funny and I was crying with laughter, they were so nice they even offerred me a cuppa and a slice of cake, bless them.
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Oh, OK, who wrote the script for that??
 
Where I ride there are nice sandy tracks- but I once met a walker who seriously thought that someone had brought the sand and made the track sandy.
 
At uni I studied environmental management. We went on trip one day to a local common to take samples from the pond. We knew in advance where we were going yet a group of girls on the course still turned up in their white trainers and complained about getting them dirty.
 
WelshD said:
I breed chickens for showing and have over twenty cockerels. I hold my breath for quite a while after someone new moves to the village!
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ha :) know the feeling. don't you have bantams though? quiet wee squeaky boys ;D luckily my big Scots Grey boy has a very tuneful cockadoodle do-just as well as he is LOUD..
 
AdorableAlice said:
Example one.

Group of ramblers all over 75, fair play hope I can walk for miles at that age, came across us yesterday. We are wet, swamp mud and as for gateways well, a snorkel is needed.

On hearing the screams I go out into the field and find several ladies floundering. I rescue them and get them onto concrete. Why is it so muddy dear ?, well it is winter and a wet one at that. But dear, when we came across last time it was lovely and not muddy at all. When did you last come across ?, June dear. That was followed by, why are the other fields so green. My answer of land management for the Spring did not seem to register.

I kept my cool and led them across the yard and out onto the lane, explaining that the next bit of path was very muddy. I didn't mention the five hungry, bored horses that were hanging around. They then asked me what I was going to do about the flooded path, my comment of asking him upstairs to turn the tap off seemed to go down well and off they went.

Example two.

My hay man came in this afternoon and I mention the above incident to him. Laughing he said he could better it.

He was hay making last summer on a boiling hot Sunday afternoon. Field has footpath across it and a large group of ramblers appear. Being a kind and polite man he stopped and let the group go past without covering them in dust.

A gentleman walker approached the tractor and asked the farmer if he knew what day it was. Yes it is Sunday. The walker then said the farmer should not be working on a Sunday, and the gentleman's walk had been ruined by the noise, he stated he had a right to peace and quiet whilst enjoying his walk.

The farmer explained that farming is not governed by what day it is. The seasons and the weather dictate what happens in the countryside. The walker was having none of it and said he would be reporting the farmer for ruining the peace of the countryside on a Sunday.

The next bit I cannot repeat, but think baler, bottom and no sunshine.
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Ladyinred said:
I once found a massive extended Eastend family having a picnic in a field adjoining a footpath. They were loud, but nice people , so I told them they were off the path and couldn't stay where they were.

'Oh why love, we ain't doin' no 'arm and we'll pick up all the rubbish'

'No sorry you REALLY need to move because...'

'C'mon love we're all unpacked now and we had a helluva job getting Uncle Ted's wheelchair across the grass..'

The whole lot of them joined in pleading their case, I think there were eleven of them... they went on and on and on until finally I got a word in..

'But, we have a bull in this field, that's why we have a notice on the gate'

'Haha love, nice try. You ain't gonna scare us orf like like. Look, they are cows and they even have calves with them..'

So, I walked across the field , put my finger through the nose ring on the Lincoln Red bull and led him over to join the party (he was actually a real softy, but you can't take the chance pf getting sued)

'So,' I said, 'Is this a bull or is it bull****?'

Never seen anyone pack up and move all their food, plus Uncle Ted in his wheelchair into the 'proper' field, full of apologies and 'Don't you go letting go of him now.'

Very very funny and I was crying with laughter, they were so nice they even offerred me a cuppa and a slice of cake, bless them.
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Love these - made my evening :D
 
I am soo envious of those who live in the country, I'm a 'townie' but love the countryside and its smells and sounds (one day we may be able to afford a house with a little land). I would never dream of moving to the country and complaining about it - also my girls are at primary school and share my love of the outdoors, know which animals their food comes from and not that it comes from Tesco's chiller section unlike most of their class mates and unfortunately their own parents :(
 
A couple of years ago I went on a lunchtime walk with a couple of the boys at work when we were out at a client in the middle of nowhere. We stayed on the clients land (a school) and got to a gate that was locked. Both looked at each other and said we'd have to turn back, I told them not to be so ridiculous, jumped the fence (in my heels and suit) and watched them both clamber over it looking a bit unsure of touching the fence/getting dirty.
 
Seriously, try living next door to them...

"your cockerel wakes me up"
Yes, it's a working farm and the hens/cockerels/geese/ducks/quail were here when you moved in.

"Your farm light is too bright and shines right in our window"
It's a security light aimed in to the middle of the farm yard.

"Do you have to be moving that tractor around at 9am on a Sunday?"
Yes love, as we've already said this is a working farm and it's harvest season.

"Your strimmer is scaring my horse"
Tough ****

Honestly, I love it when it comes up to slurry spreading, they've been here for years but it still horrifies them!!
Seriously this is a working farm and has been for decades, surely you check things like this out before buying a house?!!
 
I'm like RainbowDash, live in a town but thanks to my horses I spend most of my free time rurally, I would so love to live in a village but I know I never will because my poor little house in a crap area is what enables me to have the horses. I always get really annoyed by stories of people that move to villages and then set about trying to destroy anything actually rural that happens in their eye line from whinging about horse poo on the road to church bells chiming. I don't know what they expect village/rural life to be like!

I also related to the story about being impervious to mud and poo, recently a friend and I were walking to the pub and we were walking on a grass verge, she was telling me to "Mind the mud" and I really couldn't see what she meant because to me "mud" doesn't start til it's over the top of your foot at the very least :)
 
Re mention of horse poo in the road in the post above...I have had someone stop their car and ask me (just as my pony was depositing that mornings feed onto the village road from under his tail!) if I was going to get off and pick it up???!!!!!! I politely told her she could have it for her roses and I wouldn't even charge her for it! :D
 
exmoorponyprincess1 said:
Re mention of horse poo in the road in the post above...I have had someone stop their car and ask me (just as my pony was depositing that mornings feed onto the village road from under his tail!) if I was going to get off and pick it up???!!!!!! I politely told her she could have it for her roses and I wouldn't even charge her for it! :D
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people used to run out with shovels after you back in the day *sighs*
 
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Oh lol too funny! I'm so glad that we own a goodly amount of land to which Joe Bloggs public can't come through without our permission, and that all my neighbours are farmers. Although it is quite funny that you have these little stories to tell.
 
I'm at Uni, on an agricultural campus. My flatmate came bounding into the kitchen exclaiming that there was a Turkey staring at her through the fire escape door. She retrieved some bread and pottered off to feed aforementioned bird. Out of curiosity I popped my head round the corridor door - said bird was a rather magnificent male pheasant. A completely different flatmate also excitedly described the very same bird to me - again as a turkey.

It certainly made me appreciate being a country girl! That said I've said and done some pretty stupid stuff when faced with a town or city so I'm not one to talk...
 
Oh my god dont get me started!
Oh caught a woman washing her muddy boots in the horses drinking water in the field , she was quite shocked to be told off for it as "other farmers dont mind me doing it" she wasnt even apologetic when he had to tip it all out and refill it!!
There is a chap who when he first moved into the village joined the commons committee AND the went to the local council just to get concrete paths put across the common, so him and his dog didnt get dirty , he didnt like wearing wellies apparently! He didnt get the paths incidentally ;)
 
And.... we took some girls from the local radio station on a wagon ride, they couldnt get over the beautiful countryside....so i thought..." but why are all these fields empty with just sheep and cows in them, why dont they have houses on them??
 
And the chap coming out of my garden gate with his young son, " but the gate was open we were only having a look!" Said gate is down a path and then over my front lawn, Not on the road , right next to a sign that says private!
And the people who not only look through cottage windows, but cup their hand around their faces right up against the glass to get a proper view, and when told someone actually lives there ,say, " OMG I know!!!!!!" as if they just cant believe it.
 
GinaGeo said:
It certainly made me appreciate being a country girl! That said I've said and done some pretty stupid stuff when faced with a town or city so I'm not one to talk...
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Ah yes, the country bumpkin at large in the city scenario!

Despite having lived in London for a year as a student, I am now totally out of touch with city ways. I can happily self navigate my way from A to B, but was completely confuddled by the tram system in Sheffield when driving student son back to uni! OMG surely it can't be ok to drive on those tram tracks?!

I'll keep to my quiet rural life, thank you very much.
 
My sisters friends from uni had hardly ever left London. When they went to visit a friend in Reading they were like "oh my god, check my signal! my signal is getting low!" then they were commenting about the massive bird in the garden. It was a wood pigeon.

My sister is a primary school teacher (reception) and once a week they do forest school where they go into the wooded area and just play, in winter have hot chocolate around a fire, fun things like that. She is always amazed at the number of children that seemingly have never played outside. And it is now a common thing for the parents to say they can't go as it's cold and the child will get ill. They tell the parents, cold weather doesn't make you ill, germs make you ill! And some parents just don't send their child with suitable clothing. It's muddy and cold and they send the child off with jogging bottoms and no coat. Luckily they have a few spare waterproofs at school!

My ex BF grew up in Dovercourt. Him and his brothers were used to going in the sea all year round so although it is cold (even in summer!) they would just crack on and get straight in. One weekend some guys had come down from London. He said they walked into the sea a little bit then ran straight out shivering. They then saw ex BF and his brother getting in the sea a bit further down the beach. So they then picked up their things and moved down there and tried the sea again! They actually thought that the sea MUST be warmer there! Silly billys
 
This thread makes me sad. The "them" and "us". It is sad that so many people receive an education which gives them no knowledge of how or why the countryside functions, what makes it work or why it is important to preserve it, and the value the countryside environment brings to humankind and how precious it is.
Everyone will dig deep into their pockets for deforestation in the amazon rainforest charities but a little more understanding and commitment to protecting and knowing our own local UK forests and countryside wouldn't go amiss. (floodplains, housebuilding, HS2, etc).
 
Trouble is, there is a generation that has kids who believe that milk is made in factories, meat has always been in a white plastic tray and vegetables come from the freezer. Their parents are only interested in the latest reality TV show, Chat magazine and Eastenders. They have little interest in anything in nature, most could only identify one bird because it appears on xmas cards every year. Sadly, their children are growing up with little respect for the countryside as their parents have no interest.
 
My sister took her class to a farm. The farmer held up a sprout and asked if anyone knew what it was and hinted "you eat it at Christmas". One kid asked if it was a turkey. Oh dear!
 
lhotse said:
Trouble is, there is a generation that has kids who believe that milk is made in factories, meat has always been in a white plastic tray and vegetables come from the freezer. Their parents are only interested in the latest reality TV show, Chat magazine and Eastenders. They have little interest in anything in nature, most could only identify one bird because it appears on xmas cards every year. Sadly, their children are growing up with little respect for the countryside as their parents have no interest.
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In the unlikely event I ever have kids...I would never let that happen to mine!

Sadly, you're far too right :(
It's really funny, but also a little scary! A friend came over to see the horses and we saw/heard a pheasant...she asked me in all seriousness if "The turkey would eat her?!" no, love! It is the parents that are mainly at fault - her parents were just not interested and a cat was about as much wildlife as they could deal with!
The scariest one I heard was my ex-sister-in-law. She comes from the US and genuinely asked me...no word of a lie...if the bit at the back of the horse was a 5th leg!!!
 
This thread has made me chuckle :)
I live in the far west of Cornwall, so do see a lot of tourists in the summer. The funniest thing is their grasp of the back lanes..if you haven't been here, they are narrow and bordered by high Cornish hedging, sometimes wide enough to allow two cars to pass each other, sometimes with passing places. The visitors often have no idea how wide their car actually is, so flinch madly when you pass them (their faces are hilarious), and quite often have no reversing skills. Reversing is compulsory, sometimes for many many yards, to get back to a suitable passing place. I have a friend who delivers fresh fish from the Newlyn fish markets to local restaurants, and he has told me of the many times he has actually had to get out of his van and reverse somebody's car FOR them.
 
And...the chap staying in a holiday home opposite me, which is right on a junction of a single track lane. He was sitting in his car outside the house.
Me, "you cant park there you are blocking the lane, no one can get past" .
him, ignoring me
Me," excuse me!"
Him "what!!"
Me, you are blocking the lane, you'll soon have to move if a tractor needs to get through!
Him, "what on earth are you talking about its Sunday!!"
 
Ughhh grockles on the roads in summer!

We had one women stop and refuse to reverse 50yards for a tractor with trailer stacked with grass for the pit and half a dozen cars behind him. My husband was there for 40minutes with everyone shouting at this useless women who just sat there ignoring then all waiting for the tractor and massive Que of God knows how many by then to reverse about a mile back to the nearest passing place. In the end someone got her out and reversed for her. Didn't even apologise just ranted about tractors being on the road...

I don't moan so much about the country but I won't lie and say it's plain sailing for us as we only have a woodburner and an electric blanket. We don't have a cooker (no gas) can't have an electric cooker as the wiring is dodgy. The Barn needs a lot of work so winter can suck but my Lord it's so worth it!!

Oh and I have a bantam cock and he has an enormous crow at 5am hehe upsets the guests nicely he does.
 
I find round here, which is on the edge of a city which suddenly changes to complete countryside, quite bad. There is a lovely massive forest which is a short drive from the city, very popular with dog walkers but it is long and linear, so they usually don't reach the far side. However on the side near the city, it can be a bit chaotic as the people who venture only a few hundred metres from their parked cars are completely out of their element. There is a trend, in that some people tend to get very upset by anything moving faster than a slow walking speed and tend to vent about it by way of complaint to the person moving faster. So in a short space of time, I've had the following incidents:

- woman came out of house to reprimand me for trotting on bridlepath past her house, saying my horse's hooves were damaging it.

- I always walk past pedestrians but male dog walker saw me trotting in the distance before I came down to walk and started shouting at me that I wasn't allowed to ride in the forest. Meanwhile, his dog, which was loose, came over and started barking at my horse. On telling him I was next to a local equestrian centre which used the forest extensively, as did I most days, he informed me that he was a Forestry Commission officer and that I was wrong. So I got his name, contacted the Forestry Commission and they were most concerned they had someone going about impersonating one of their employees!

- While out running, a man started shouting at me, and when I stopped to ask him what was wrong, told me I should be wearing hi-viz clothing. "But you're dressed all in black yourself" I said.

Theres also quite a few people who seem to be city types but who move out to the countryside:

- Passing another house at the end of a canter track (everyone canters there as its one of the few safe places to do so), man told me to walk as his children were scared by the sound of the "thundering hooves" in the distance. I looked up and saw two little faces of children pressed against the window of the house, watching the world go by.

- At another livery yard once I cantered up a track again, it was quite stony in a few places, so it was a very slow canter for a few strides only. There were some horses 3 fields and about quarter of a mile away. When I got back, the YO had had a complaint from the owner of these horses, as the sight of my horse "galloping out of control" in the distance had scared her horses and they had got excited and cantered about the field.
 
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