a farmers life for me - bbc

[niknik]

just watched the latest episode...........

what hope is there for the contestants......
when voice- over guy..." a milk goat in HIS prime........"

[Berti]

I am interested to see how it further develops.
been following for a bit and I can really raise my eyebrows what some people come up with, and I am not (nor ever gonna be) a farmer (FEMALE).

the series sure have been an eyeopener to me, what a farm has to do to make things profitable and bring money in.
if you farm just for yourself well OK but I guess when you've got a farm you've not an income yet.......
welcome in the real world.... ;) I'd rather stay an Isher.
or Urban Farmer. or however we are being called these days.

[pops]

final next week, it's been an odd sausage of a series - infuriating but interesting. i would like a series about sheep and spinning now please mr bbc, can you earmark my telly license to spend on that?! :D

[Berti]

LOL pops!!!! But yes BBC is the only one who does good series and documentational stuff still.
That said, I live in netherlands....says enough huh that I mostly watch BBC hehehe

I agree with you.
Sheep we want!!

[Millymollymandy]

Who won? I can't find out by googling.

However if you google "a farmers life for me bbc contestants" then look at images you get pictures of Stonehead Croft and Bonniethomas' avatar!!!

[Millymollymandy]

ha ha I think back at the beginning they were on the 'buck your socks up' list weren't they? I saw from the iplayer screen that the other couple were the oldies - is that right? (who also were down the bottom once too I think) Amazing both those couples got to the finals, but then everyone had their shortcomings I reckon.

[Berti]

I have found it very interesting to follow this series and see who won!
Definitely all the contestants had their shortcomings, and well, you can always learn from mistakes you make.
Hope Ray and Jane will be smart enough to come up with some solutions, and its good they will receive one year support.......

Definitely not my cup of tea.....

[pops]

MMM - yes ray and jayne were in the bottom the first two weeks in a row! but i'm glad they got rid of all the young professionals, i thought the older cupke were unfairkly balanced, in that the wife was fabulous and the husband was less so

i would have preferred more actual farming, rather than so much pressure to come up with products with unique selling points and so on. but i can appreciate that if he's paying the bills for the first year he wants to see a profit!

[Millymollymandy]

i would have preferred more actual farming, rather than so much pressure to come up with products with unique selling points and so on. but i can appreciate that if he's paying the bills for the first year he wants to see a profit!

That's why I stopped watching it eventually because it had become more of a marketing/cooking programme than anything to do with farming. I don't know of any farmers who have to come up with ideas of silly food thingies to sell - they just sell their animals and crops to make a living.

[Millymollymandy]

Anyway I suppose just being the winners of this programme will become their 'unique selling point' for whatever product they decided upon.... although it will only work for those who have seen this programme and know what it is about!

A bit like those who won a restaurant in that Raymond Blanc series - guess a lot of people who watched the series would have gone to eat there just to see what it was like.

[grahamhobbs]

I have to say I think the final programme was a farce. I liked both couples, both worked together well as couples and both undertook the physiscal farming side fairly well. But the winners didn't seem to have learnt anything in terms of organising or planning a small farm in all the weeks of the series. They had nice products but the products tomato sauce and mutton burgers didn't relate to what they were raising, 50 chickens, 40 pigs and only 10 sheep. And they were aiming for a turnover of £7500/year from these products, an actual income of perhaps £2k. (and no one factored in the cost of those kilner jars!).
The older couple, sure were over optimistic in their sales. But it was a proper plan, their product was made entirely from the produce of the farm, it was all there in the right balance, with sensible stocking rates. OK it was probably over ambitious to expect to be able to raise and make everything from the bread to the vegetables to the meat, but they had obviously learnt something over the series and you could be confident that if one thing didn't work they would rethink and come up with an alternative strategy.
The winners a lovely couple, on the contary you feel will need their hands holding all the way through, to be told exactly how to organise their farm, their sales, everything....and then when they know what they are doing by shear hard work they will make a success of it.
Perhaps I'm being biaised but I think the decision was agiest and the producers had an eye on a follow up programme tracing the winning couple over their year on the farm and the younger couple will have bigger audience appeal.

[MKG]

I think the right couple won, mainly because the older bloke would sooner or later have come up with the idea of making a model farm out of plywood and rubber gloves and then spent all of his time explaining the model to the one per cent of visitors who may have been interested. Also, I don't agree that the presentation of the older couple was better - yes, Ray and Jayne were hopelessly below the mark with their figures, but that's no worse (and possibly actually better) than totally over the top, which the older couple were.

One question, though - if this was the final in which the two couples were asked to prove their true worth, why the hell were they given a young, inexperienced sheepdog? Makes for better telly, methinks?

Mike

[boboff]

Sounds like there forecast were more for the watching Tax Man rather than to live on!