Farming Diaries Part 2: from the driving seat (DVD) - Stephen Richmond & Jonathan Whitlam

For nearly twenty years  Stephen Richmond has worked for farmer John Raven, near Lowestoft,  Suffolk. The farm has grown to well over 500 acres, an arable unit  whose main crops are oilseed rape, sugar beet, potatoes, wheat and  barley.

Stephen’s DVD  diary covers a typical year from January to December to include all  the arable operations from seedbed preparation to harvesting. The  machinery used is diverse, including Case IH, John Deere and Claas  tractors, not to forget an MF 135 still drilling sugar beet. In  addition to these there is a feature on the many demonstration models  Stephen has been able to try out on the farm, while a second feature  looks in detail at the MXM 120 as a ‘Jack of all trades’.

Other machinery  includes the unusual Case IH Axial–Flow 2788 combine as well as a  number of harvesters, some belonging to the farm and some run by  contractors. The move to use contractors is one of the developments  Stephen has seen during his working life, as he explains when he  talks about recent developments in machinery and farm practice.

Stephen Richmond,  along with Jonathan Whitlam, came to prominence in the late 1990s  when their first ‘Tractor Boys’ videos  were released. They have since been behind many popular DVDs and now  run their own list under the name Tractor Barn Productions.