Farmer's Diary

MOSSIE heaps a lot of praise on himself because he has a pork factory so efficient that one man can look after 320 sows single-handedly, taking their young all the way through to market. A normal farm would have three or four men for such a job, so our man feels that he is quite smart.

He is not feeling so smart this week. The one man is on holiday and Mossie is on for pigger. He has six foolscap pages of instructions and his head is ''bizzin'' with all the things he has to remember.

I'll tell you all about it in a minute, but first a story of which I was reminded when listening spellbound to Sheila Wellington reopening the Scottish Parliament with A Man's a Man For a' That.

Jimmy Ellis, the bobby at Longside in Aberdeenshire, believed ''the man's the gowd for a' that''.

In the late 1930s there was installed in Longside one of the first ''Halt. Major Road Ahead'' signs. That was a gift to Jimmy Ellis. Aided by a handy bush in which he could hide, Jimmy was able to apprehend a constant stream of law-breakers who sailed through the junction as they always had without thought for the new sign.

Most had never thought the manner of their coming into the High Street was anybody's business but their own, but PC Ellis sent them all to see the sheriff. It was good money for the Aberdeenshire County Council. Then one day Jimmy stopped a member of the police committee, in point of fact the Young Laird's grandfather. A man being a man for a' that, the old laird was duly charged. But Jimmy was horrified when notice came back that no action was to be taken in this case. The democratic policeman achieved immortality in Aberdeenshire by writing to the chief constable of the county in the following terms: ''If there is to be one law for the rich and another for the poor, in respect of the new halt sign, will you please forward to your obedient servant a hacksaw and I will hew it down myself.''

That was in the days before farm servants, as they were known then, had holidays at all. They might get off to an agricultural show or a Highland Games if it was raining. They would get a day or two twice a year at term-time to allow them to change farms. After the kine were milked and the horses corned and bedded, they had Sundays off and New Year's Day. But otherwise a farm worker could look forward to at least 10 hours of work every day, between leaving school and retiring or, as was common, dying in harness.

Then, after the war, they got a week's annual holiday.

I remember Jimmy Low, who worked for my grandfather and my father before I inherited him, saying, when the second week was announced a few years later: ''Fa wad hae ye for a hale fortnicht?'' It just didn't occur to this man that he could lie in, do his garden, or take his wife for a walk down the back road in the middle of the day.

And now Mossie's finding out why Phil, his pigger, needs away for three weeks. He's used to taking his turn every second weekend but that's different. All he has to do then is press the buttons and they are fed. Anything that can be left for Phil on Monday is left. But in three weeks there is no escape.

So far he has had augers choking and fans breaking down, which in a heatwave can lead to disaster. There has been a cut in the power on which the whole factory depends and

my information only extends to Mossie's fourth day on his own.

In 4000 pigs there must be deaths. And much worse than that are the illnesses. The dead just have to be dragged out but the ill have to be diagnosed and treated, and they don't necessarily like it.

Then there is the insemination. On average two-and-a-half sows per day come into heat. They must be served. Now, Mossie has turned his herd over to the Boar with the Bowler Hat. Artificial insemination is cheaper if you do it yourself. Bought-in semen costs #4 a straw but it is pennies if you take semen off your own boars. Naturally, Phil has collection added to his duties.

Well, Mossie's drawing a line in the slurry. He won't tell Phil, of course, but he's bought in some semen. And as for Phil's advice

that, to avoid the boars becoming grumpy, they need to be ''relieved'' additionally, he's for nothing to do with that. ''You've often had to wait mair than three weeks yersel,'' he says, as though that had anything to do with it.

It's more than a year since Phil has had a sow return to the boar. ''Well, that'll change,'' admits our man.

And he knows what he's going to do about the dead ones next year, ''if I'm spared''. He'll buy in a few gilts and keep them secret so that he can replace any that die. Then Phil will never know.

It's fine for him to see the other side of his economy. And it's taken the pressure off the rest of us. He hasn't had time to phone and say: ''I'm busy. I'm rushed aff my feet. Are you coming' for a pint?''

And speaking of phoning, a last word on the Highland Show. For me this was the year of the mobile. Disaaaster! What is this world so full of care that we must bellow down a phone even when we're at the show? Is there to be no end to ulcers and heart attacks?

There were times at this year's show when it was hard to find anyone to speak to. Outside every stand there was a line of people with a phone on one ear, a hand over the other, and a worried expression on their faces.

And mobile phoners are so rude. You just get going on your currently favourite story when one of your listeners gets a call. Without apology, or moving off, he interrupts by bawling at his plastic toy about what an easy run we had on the way down and what a fine day it is.

And what a lot of cowards we all are to put up with it. I hold my story until he's finished and then try to get to the punchline before somebody's else's wife phones up to make sure the coast is clear.

That was a downer. But consider our shock when we returned and went to the Salmon Inn for a quick half before going home. There were three drinkers at the bar, each with a mobile beside his pint.

As the Farmer said to the Red Rooster: ''That's how to relax.''