The Good the Bad and the Ugly

The Good

Take it from me farming has many great positives. For me its the mental intensity, the constant review process, the drive to get up each day and do it better  For our team its about the cows and growing the best quality pasture we can to feed them.

For Louise its taking care of next gen

The Bad

But lets be honest there can be some serious negatives. It is well known farming is one of the most dangerous occupations in Australia. Only one in 10 workplaces are farms, yet they account for one quarter of all work-related deaths. Children under 15 years and adults over 65 years are more likely than others to be injured or killed on farms. Males are more likely to be injured than females via http://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/bhcv2/bhcarticles.nsf/pages/Farm_safety_risks_and_hazards?open

Yesterday’s post  The big wet has left us a little worse for wear in more ways than one was a timely reminder to stay safe on farm

The Ugly

Farming is also very physical and pretty hard on the body

These are farmers knees – not a pretty site. Plenty of bone on bone here and shortly Michael is having a double knee replacement and they tell us that’s not much fun. Michael has a condition called traumatic arthritis which is a legacy of altercation 15 years ago with a bull  who ploughed him into a concrete trough

Michael isn’t having much luck lately as he was the person somersaulting down the hill in the tractor yesterday

Russell has now come and inspected the damage after the tractor lost traction on the water logged slope and slid down the hill at a rapidly increasing rate of knots and hit a tree amongst a few other things with the “old boss” on board

Russell has declared this the worst bent roll frame he has ever seen yet the drivetrain and all the castings are intact as is the driver.

 

No oil leaks and even the front axle is still intact

And it looks like the GPS is still functional and the radio works

Yes we are taking the good with the bad and the ugly and early next week we will be having a team meeting and reviewing our Farm Safe procedures.

Stay safe Michael