The Archers Friday 2nd September 2011: Friends of Ambridge Organics

• Did Ruth say custard?
• No rollover crush for Brookfield
• New Smithsfield
• Josh really does prefer milking to school
• Flail the spuds
• Kenton and Kirsty caught acting suspicious …
• Brenda’s great plans

Did Ruth say custard?

Josh is helping Ruth do the milking.

Did I hear her right when she said:

[Ruth] “You wash and strip them, I’ll put the custard on”

I admit to knowing nothing about milking cows.

Is custard normally involved?


No rollover crush for Brookfield

Josh wants Ruth to buy one, as he reckons it looks funny, but it doesn’t sound particularly fun for the cows …


New Smithsfield

Used to be in London (when it was old Smithsfield) and happened just before Christmas.

But now it moves round.

And it’s a dairy event.

So now you know.


Josh really does prefer milking to school

It’s his last day doing his morning milking (he’ll still get to help with the afternoon), and Ruth won’t let him off school to go to Smithsfield.

I wonder.

Will Josh leave school and start working on the farm – getting there before Pip leaves Uni?


Flail the spuds

Which is what Tony’s just off to do when Brenda calls round to see Pat.

Seems they do have blight.

But it’s all fine Tony.

Brenda has great plans to save Bridge Farm …


Kenton and Kirsty caught acting suspicious …

After all the effort Kenton went to in encouraging Freda to get over her misgivings about working with crayfish:

[Kenton] “When I said I’d supply them to her shelled, and she could treat them just like big prawns, then she was fine about it”

Kenton has to admit that he’ll have to stop crayfish action until he finds a new supplier.

He tells Kirsty about what’s being going on – and she reckons she’s also partly to blame. It was her who’d told Josh about the crayfish in the first place.

(have a look at http://ponderingthearchers.blogspot.com/2011/07/archers-thursday-14th-july-2011-fallons.html)

So, Kirsty insists on tagging along with Kenton to go and see Josh.

They have to meet Josh in secret:

[Kenton] “I’m quite happy not to give Dave a reason to lecture me about irresponsible food sourcing … I think the family has finally stopped thinking of me as the village idiot and I'd rather like to keep it that way”

Josh seems a bit sheepish, but is mainly worried about getting into trouble. Kenton assures him he won’t (and his folks won’t be told), and he can walk away with the £50 profit he made:

[Kenton] “You’ve had a bit of fun, and you’ve learnt something”

But, Kirsty isn’t so easy on Josh … or Kenton, for that matter.

She goes on a bit of a rant about how it was illegal … that someone up north was fined thousands for doing the same thing – that it was dangerous … the traps also catch native crayfish as well … could also catch mammals like water voles and otters … American carry crayfish plague, which Jamie could have also spread … the crayfish are aggressive … and Josh could have caught Weil’s disease (“like the rower”) …

At all of that, Josh makes haste away from Kenton and Kirsty, probably adamant he never wants to see a crayfish again.

[Kenton] “I feel terrible now. I had no idea it was so dangerous!”

Kirsty admits that she was laying it on thick, so that Josh wouldn’t just keep catching crayfish or other customers.

But job done.

Actually – Kirsty and Kenton managed to achieve something else with their wee secret meeting with Josh.

[Ruth, quite startled] “Morning. What are you too doing at the bottom of our drive?”

Kenton mumbles something about driving Kirsty to work (even though she already lives in Borchester), that she got cramp, and that they had to stop to let her walk around. Then they both jump in the car and sped off.
Yup. That’ll start the Ambridge drums a banging …


Brenda’s great plans

All involve the website.

Again.

Next week, she wants to do an article on how all of the family are mucking in – and wants pictures of them harvesting the veg by hand.

Nice idea.

But will it get any buyers back on side?

I wonder the same about Brenda’s idea for a Facebook page – called Friends of Organic Ambridge
Specifically not making mention of Bridge Farm, it will take about organics in general, with recipes and such, linking back to the Bridge Farm website when relevant.

What’s more – Tom is going to use his Twitter account – where he normally talks about sausages and pork (exciting chap!) to mention Bridge Farm more often.

[Brenda] “It’s still quite early days, but it’s got to have a positive effect”

And I’m sure it will.

But I agree with what Tony said later on, as he made himself depressed comparing this year’s sales to last’s:

[Tony] “reminding myself that we were once a viable business … this might not be the bottom, Pat … we’re not going to solve this on a website … how long is that going to take?”

[Pat] “But it’s all we can do, isn’t it. Got to remain positive”

Actually – Pat does have a point.

As much as I’m knocking Tom and Brenda – I don’t have any brighter ideas right now …