# 10. Farming 1979/85

During this time, big changes happened on most farms in Thanet. The most visible being the disappearance of the dairy herds and sheep.  Nearly all farms that had ground on the marshes (with the exception of Sherrifs Court) had live stock of some sort, as prior to the marshes being drained, most fields were in grass.  Monkton Court cows and sheep had all gone by about 1982, as with Willetts, Robinsons and Tapps, the sheep went at the same time.  The only dairy cows left in Thanet by 1985 were the half dozen or so that the Nuns had at Minster Abbey.  Quex Park continued to have a bullock herd and Tapps at St Nicholas Court had a few in the fields next to the farm.  I think that turkey production at Monkton Court finished in 1983.

A horrendous incident involving the dairy herd of Monkton Court happened in 1979/80.  When I went over the railway crossing at the start of the working day at Sherrifs Court, I noticed that a train was stationary near the railway bridge Canterbury side of Monkton and no trains ran for most of the day.  Later in the evening I met my life-long friend, Gordon Morris, who then worked for Monkton Court, for a couple of pints in The White Stag, to hear that the cows had somehow gotten onto the railway line and 10/12 of them had been killed.

My time with our New Holland 1545 combine came to an end in 1985.  The technology in the 1545 was outdated.  If I had a really good day I could cut 12 acres (the combines you see in Thanet today can cut more than that in an hour!), and with more than 300 acres of wheat to cut, we had to get contractors in to make sure that we finished harvesting in a reasonable time.  Fred bought a 3 year old New Holland 8080, the same size header as the 1545, but its daily cutting ability doubled and in its first year we no longer needed contractors in to complete our harvest.

Two things happened to wheat production during this period. Up until then, a good crop of wheat on Thanet farms was about 2 tonnes to the acre and the stalks of wheat on average were 4 ft long, very prone to falling over. Short strawed varieties were introduced and on these varieties the numbers of grains of wheat almost doubled, 3 tonnes to the acre soon became a good average, 4 tonne is expected today.

*Terry Marsh*

Originally published in the Monkton News (June 2025).