From the farm at Yockenthwaite

11:07am Thursday 14th August 2008

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We had a ride down the Dale to Burnsall tonight to deliver some Granola; in the wake of a heavy shower and receding blue-black rain clouds, the sun was shining and in front of us was probably one of the most magnificent rainbows I have ever seen. I just wish that I had had my camera in the car.

The bands of colour were vivid and quite clear to see and several cars had pulled over on the roadside, the occupants obviously marvelling at the view as the arch spanned the whole of the valley.

The light was beautiful, highlighting in fine detail every rock, wall and tree, but by the time we had made our delivery and started on the return journey the magic had disappeared.

The roads were quiet, unusually so for mid-August; I don't think we met any more than half a dozen cars all the way home. At this time of year you usually have to add an extra 10 minutes or so to your journey time because of the slow holiday traffic.

The majority of vehicles that we met on the way down were locals, heading to a Kilnsey Show meeting at the Tennants, we decided. Last-minute preparations, no doubt; a lot of unseen work behind the scenes; it will soon be here.

It is a busy time of year, both inside and out and even though we still have a lot of standing grass, other work has to go on.

Inside we are trying to get ahead and build up stocks of Granola because we have another busy spell ahead of us. In addition to our wholesale customers and regular farmers' markets we have several local agricultural shows and the Harrogate Flower Show in early September.

At the moment things are going smoothly and I feel on top of things. The worry is that, as we continue to grow, sourcing quality raw ingredients is going to become more of an issue.

Honey is definitely going to be a problem; we use quite a lot, probably in the region of 150 to 200lb a week on current production levels. We secured a supply from a local apiary last year and they can keep us going, but even they are struggling because a lot of colonies of bees have been lost this year. It seems that there just isn't any honey!

We could use imported honey, but the quality and specification is not up to the standard that we want and they cannot guarantee that antibiotics have not been used. I did send for a sample to look at and asked for the specification, only to find that the country of origin was "Argentina, Mexico, Brazil, Guatemala, Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary"!

Stuart took a couple of geld (barren) cows to Skipton on Monday, they came to good money. He tried to get them there last week but the morning ended up with a trip to A&E at Airedale General because one of the cows kicked at the retaining gate when he and Eddy were loading them and it bounced back and hit him in the face cutting his forehead; a wound that required six stitches. It is healing nicely and there has been little bruising so he has been quite lucky.

It does make you realise, though, how easily accidents can happen and also how far away we are from emergency services.