11. Farming 1979/85

During this period cauliflowers and potatoes were the main earner on most of the farms who had land on the uplands of Thanet.

This was a time before potatoes were imported. Arran Commet, then the most popular variety, would be planted in March with the hope of digging the first ones at the beginning of June. Thanet was often the first area in the country to be able to do this and was a very good earner for two or three weeks. The potatoes would all be picked up by hand and carefully looked after so as not to damage the skins or bruise them (the condition of the some of the early potatoes I see in shops and supermarkets today would have been deemed unsaleable then). Potato planters had now moved on from a man on a tractor and four people on the planter, moving at about 1 mile an hour, to a driver and one man on the back. The seed potatoes now being tipped into a big hopper and then belt fed into the ground, forward speed as fast as you could sensibly go.

At the end of this period on a lot of farms, we saw the end of seed potatoes being stored in wooden trays, with seed being supplied in 1 tonne bags. All new seed potatoes are supplied by growers in Scotland, the main reason for this being that the over winter cold weather kills off all the nasty bugs and viruses in the ground that may affect the germination and growth of the new seed. Many farms would traditionally grow a small section of the new seed and harvest it for their own use the following year, known as ‘one year off’ seed, this practice has largely died out now.

Cauliflowers were seen all over the uplands of Thanet. A huge majority of them being planted in the fields in which the early potatoes had been planted. Montgomery’s were the largest growers on the Island, with farms at Seamark Road and Thorne Hill. In this period, cauliflowers were an October to April crop.

Cauliflower ‘Rigs’, tractors with a platform built around them for packing the cauliflowers as they were cut, were used on most farms. A team of between 8 and 12 men and women were needed to operate one of these rigs, a driver, 2 packers and the rest cutting. These gangs would be cutting between 6 and 9 hours a day depending on which farm they worked. The cauliflowers were packed either 12 or 16 to a crate depending on size. When a rig was full it would be driven off to an unloading ramp, an empty rig would take its place.

All crates would be stacked on the loading ramps to await collection by various transport firms. Whites Transport from Minster would take most of Montgomery’s. None of these crates were on pallets until they were on the lorries.

As you can imagine, this was a very strenuous job. During winter, those doing the cutting would be walking in mud and wheel ruts full of water all day. I have known a few who did this for years and blame it for their worn-out hips and knees.

Terry Marsh

Originally published in the Monkton News (July 2025).