The good old days.....

The starter or dynamo were probably shagged as well.😯

We used to park the fiat on de hill with a hammer holding up the handbrake!. Biggest change I saw was the movement from vans and Peugeot to Jeeps. 3 or 4 of us pushing cars was a regular occurrence also, u don't see it anymore

When i worked for a neighbour early 1990s.

The Paasat started the 135.

The 135 pulled the crystal to get it going after easy start.

The crystal then hooked up to the 1600l slurry tank.

My job was to spread the slurry.

I could barely reach the pedals.

It stalled a lot.

More smoke came out of the farmer that year than out of the crystal.

Dosing cattle with bottles.

I remember a lad here got a new box type lwb trooper in 1990ish. Was a real head Turner at the time.

Bringing new born calves in from the field with a wheelbarrow and sometimes a cross cow to watch as well. Same for lambs.

Baler twine fixed everything.

I know how your daughter feels. . Its not a nice thing is imagine to have that conversation with your parents but they are lucky they had someone like you to turn to.

in my own case i worked my stones off during the recession in England and ended up buying a bit of land (7 acres) back home. Planning in kildare is so prohibitive and costly that we couldn't take the risk on paying for plans etc to be turned down so purchased a house further out from Dublin where housing is affordable but the commute Is longer.

Dont want to be stung with a massive mortgage and not able to pay it if there was another crash so I'm living in lovely leitrim now. I love the area down here and people are lovely but the 4 hrs a day in the car is a killer if I'm in Dublin for work (usually 3 days per week). Not complaining too much though. Others are in far worse situations than me

That attitude wasn't confined to rural Ireland only - it was global and still is in some Countries.

Certain things were better. Looking now as a dad and a teacher. School Bullying ended at the school gate- now it’s on phones.

the worst secret was the fat fella with a beard. A friends 10yo daughter was asking about a 69 because a fifth class lad was talking about it.

farming wise, growing mass quantities of spuds for the pigs was hardship as we were the machines.

”the captain” used come around killing them.

milked cows, walked 2km across fields to clean sheds and feed cattle. went to school.

slatted house came when I was 16 so no more walking to small sheds.

trammed hay because the balers kept breaking down and rain was always around the corner.

we saved 20-30 trailers of turf a year for sale and killed turkeys for the Christmas market.

all unmercifully hard work but farming is lonelier now.

it might me be but I find a lot of things a process now rather than a way of life,

When a country is poor, then those involved in producing for export, ie farmers, are always going to be the richest in society.

I spoke to a man a few years back who grew grain in the 70's.

In 1974 he got 125 pounds a tonne, fertilizer was a pound or two a bag. He also taught and was paid 125 a month for teaching at an ag college.

We got 200 euro for feed barley this year. How much do teachers make per month now?!!!!

A quick anecdote about the value of agricultural produce and it's purchasing power over the last century or so:

I know it's going back in time but a local farm of 100 acres or so, with a decent 2 storey house which still stands today was bought in 1919 (just after WW1 when beef was very scarce) with the proceeds of 50 fat heifers.

Fast forward to the mid seventies, a local man I know built his 4 bed bungalow from the proceeds of a truck load of cattle which was 13 grand or so he told me.

What would 40 cattle do for you now, would it get you an kitchen extension?

Ya remember a time when oldest sister got married and they moved in to New bungalow and there was concrete floors and and seats from an old Ford cortina in sitting room for a while things were that bad but they were happy and they got there, that was back in the early 80s

Why was 99% of the farming community driving clapped out tractors and cars back in the good old days if a few cattle would have bought new ones!

You’re 100% right, a friend of mine was giving out recently because the bank wouldn’t give him enough money so he could build a big garage and do a tarmacadam driveway along with his 3500 ft2 house, when I tried to tell him that he could just finish some rooms and do the shed and driveway over the next 10 years his arguement was “you wouldn’t buy a car and then start putting in the engine and gearbox over a few years”, I said you wouldn’t but you’d just buy a car you can afford, might as well hop my head off a wall as talk to him, there’s something desperately wrong with some people’s mentality and I hate to say a lot of them are my age

I know a lad who wanted to leave upstairs unfinished and just live down stairs, bank said no but he couldn't borrow the amount needed to complete all the house. So parents had to help him.

I remember my father and uncle's selling cattle in the mart and they thought they were made up. In reality its was a yearly event and no spare change. They loved their work and did things manually.

Much better times now financially but are we any the happier....

I think why they were happy with their lot was because it was an achievement to keep their business going for another year because of their experience of their youth. Whereas our generation want to buy that new tractor or shed or whatever.

we didn't pay for cattle tags, herd test , sheep tags, bvd testing, nct, crv, test. acot (pre teagasc) were free

car and tractor were often a couple of months out of tax and a form stamped by the guards no questions asked, cleared any back tax

OK, I like to think I have an open mind. Whether that's true or not is another story!

Out of interest what would some examples of these enterprises be and what kind of investment of time and money would they require?

And most importantly is there a good chance of there being a decent market for them in this country?

Future options like organic, regenerative, carbon sequestration, emissions reduction are for other threads. This is about old ways of doing things, the less stressful but more hardship way of life. Have we made progress?