Storing Carrots, Roasting Chestnuts

All in an autumn day’s work at Maesmawr Hall, Welshpool: collecting and roasting chestnuts, storing root vegetables, accordion playing.

Like squirrels, humans too can store food for the winter! Here Clare and Rosemary Trant of Maesmawr Hall farm, Welshpool, cover circular layers of carrots – plus beetroot and parsnips - with sand, creating a bee-hive shaped construction that will ensure the vegetables keep well for months. The edible chestnuts they collect with their brother, David, are not stored - they are roasted over the open fire that evening, as their mother plays tunes on the button accordion.

Ion Trant of Dovea Farm, Tipperary, Ireland, studied agriculture in Canada and joined the staff of the Welsh Plant Breeding Station, Aberystwyth, where he met his future wife, Janet Owen of Maesmawr Hall, Welshpool, both of them working on developing improved grasses for upland farms with George Stapledon. The Trants farmed at Maesmawr Hall, the adjoining farm Cefn Du, and a hill farm - Esgairdraenllwyn at Llaithddu, Llandrindod. Ion created/filmed the "Country Close-Up" series for children (BBC - 1956-62), often featuring his own 3, and subsequently obtained work as a freelance cameraman. As John Kerry, he provided a column for the Montgomeryshire Express on the farming life.