Jim Baird

Jan 16, 2025 | thescottishfarmer.co.uk | Jim Baird

I must admit I am not a big fan of this time of year. Call me a wimp, but some of these cold days are no pleasure to man nor beast. The festive period always seems especially tough. It feels like everyone else is off for a fortnight, while we are chasing about very much at our busiest. It also didn’t help this year that some of the team were laid low with a nasty flu bug. You could argue that some of the workload is self-inflicted.

Dec 7, 2024 | thescottishfarmer.co.uk | Jim Baird

Well at least we have had a cracking back-end to the year. A spell of weather like this earlier in the year would have been much handier, but none the less it has been great to be able to bring stock in when they were due to come in rather than be forced in by wet ground conditions. However, we can’t forget the horrors of this summer entirely. At our recent discussion group meeting there were two things that almost everyone agreed on.

Nov 13, 2024 | classiccitynews.com | Jim Baird

By Jim BairdWestern Europe and the United States both loom large and stand shoulder to shoulder as they cast together the centuries-long shadow of the colonial period. That period saw an organized extraction of natural and cultural resources that continues to this day. William Faulkner famously said that past is not dead and buried, it isn’t even past. European and American rulers invaded and occupied vast territories, often cruelly, mostly in the globe’s southern hemisphere.

Oct 27, 2024 | thescottishfarmer.co.uk | Jim Baird

At least most of September and early October have given us a bit of an upturn in the weather. It was good to see harvest getting tidied up around the country, although I hear stories of very disappointing yields locally, which are not surprising considering how little we saw of the sun this summer. We managed to tidy a fifth cut of silage off around mid-September. It wasn’t a massive crop, but we were just pleased to get it chopped in good order.

Oct 1, 2024 | energycentral.com | Jim Baird

The Kardashev Energy Scale Maximus VeritasIn a recent The Economic Times article,  Elon Musk says “The World Isn't Using The Sun's Energy Enough Because Most People Don't Do The Math”. "Once you understand the Kardashev Scale, it becomes utterly obvious that essentially all energy generation will be solar," he insists. The Kardashev scale is a method of measuring a civilization's level of technological advancement based on the amount of energy it is capable of harnessing and using.