Vine anyone?

Pea viners at work.....

Well... I said they were 'in the area' and sure enough when I returned home from 'market' on Sunday evening there they were - working through the fields almost adjacent to us. Like London buses pea viners come in threes! Like London buses they also move extremely slowly.... but the noise and the smell they make are unique.   A deep,round, rumbling like no other alerts you to the fact they are in the vicinity; when you look for 'where' you see the heat haze first and then the entourage - rest wagon, 'comfort' wagon, fuel tankers, tractors, trailers, lorries to whisk the freshly stripped peas to processing plant in the shortest possible time.............. an entire 'factory on wheels' that moves into the fields like a swarm of locusts, stripping them of tons of peas per hour. 

Peas don't come any fresher than this.....

And the smell? Close your eyes and conjure up the scent of the freshest, sweetest peas newly crushed in the palm of your hand........... then multiply it 1,000-fold. 10,000-fold even. It pervades the air and overwhelms the senses, cloying almost in its 'green'-ness. The viners, like monstrous predators, crawl across the fields gobbling the acres and stripping the vines; rumbling, turning this way and that; disgorging their load into vast trailers beckoned seemingly silently to their sides; those loads transferred to waiting lorries which whisk them away to be sorted, packed, frozen, transported to a supermarket shelf near you.....
When these fields are done the cavalcade moves on to the next 'plantation' ..... a regional rotation planned with precision prior to planting time to ensure optimum cropping................ a wonderful harmony of man and nature that plays out every year unbeknownst to almost everybody. A privilege, therefore, to witness,

Left-overs

The first morning after harvest the fields are silent; discarded vines lie in rows like straw after the wheat has 'gone' ---- most of the pods 'popped' open and clean of their fruits. But a closer look shows that many have missed that fate. By the second morning the gulls and crows have moved in and are noisily gorging themselves on left-overs; after them, as the remains start to turn brown, come the pigeons - singly at first, then in flocks - to clean up. The noise increases as myriads of other birds move in to feast on the flies made 'homeless' by the viners....

Green straw....

I don't know how long it takes till the fields are completely emptied of their crop and ready for the plough .... but I shall find out this time round as these fields are on our daily 'dog-walk'.... and they are just as interested (for different reasons) to visit each morning........