Davies Int. Southampton. With photos (Part 1)

[wrighty]

John West:
How did you get on at Bargh’s when the Lune flooded, Wrighty?

I understand Malcolm Woodhouse had a few Mercs underwater, and there’s a tissue mill on there as well isn’t there?

John.

Afternoon John,

We weren’t as badly affected as Woodhouses but Kidds were hit very badly losing quite a few units, because ours is a 24hr operation there was staff around the yard who were able to move units and tanks before they were flooded.
Fortunately for me I was unable to get out of Wensleydale that morning because of flood water, otherwise my car would of been one of the 15 flooded at Bargh’s.
Carrs Billington and NTG paper mill were also badly affected, Carrs weighbridge was lifted out of their yard and dumped on the road outside…

Cheers Wrighty.

[peter_1961]

Buzzer:
Out with the team today along Meon sea front with the Solent in the back ground and the IOW on the horizon, weather fine but crisp Buzzer.

Saw you coming down from the yard at the bottom of Segensworth John, the rig and the team looking good you and the guys however were looking rather cold!!

Pete

[buzzer]

PDB your interpretation is not far off, it is common to put a slightly bigger horse in say the gutter side as this does have a levelling effect although I tend to swop them round as some horses look at things and push side ways. The one horse who happens to be the youngest does this when in a team but on his own driven single you could not find a better horse, should have outed him at the beginning but I persevered hoping he would improve which has not been the case. Having a relaxed settled team makes the driving bit a whole lot smoother, also a vast difference when you are say in a show ring as there are no kerbs to tell the horses where they should be, also pulling a carriage on grass Is a world apart from on a road as there is a lot more drag.
As a rule I do like voice control and believe me them horses understand common commands, when moving off I always say “all together” and they usually are, it is important to make them stand especially with no obstacles in front off them, this we do at our café stop and they definitely know where they are and have fantastic memories especially on a regular route, maybe you should come out with us one day as I think you would enjoy it.
Turned horses out in the paddock today first time this year and did they enjoy that fresh bite of grass, amazing how it’s dried after no rain for a few days.

Peter 1961 it were a bit fresh on Wednesday but we dress up warm, never notice any one when driving as have to keep your mind on the job in hand.

On the farming front I have ordered a bigger hen house as I cant keep up the supply of free range eggs, people keep coming back and they say I bought free range eggs in Tesco but there nothing like yours, gonna get another 25 or so to meet demand cheers for now Buzzer.

[peggydeckboy]

Buzzer, what you putting in them eggs then, i bet wrighty is sending down some special Yorkshire muck[ the tea].the adverts are always out side…

Could you get breathalysed if stopped by the law while in charge of the horses. and carriage. and do they[the horses] get a snack, when you are swilling tea and coffee at the café. .a carrot or two.
Thank you for the offer I would like to take you up on that later on in the year, thank you.

Keeping one horse close to the gutter is exactly the same as driving left hand drive trucks over here, if you hit every drain hole your ok . well, that is what I did and it kept me safe for years…yes when you think about where you are siting with the reins, driving your horses ,and the nearside wheel near the kerb and horse slightly offset there is a difference ,I never would have thought about .i expect the more you drive the more skill you get, not like the old cowboys in the covered wagon, they would have needed mirrors .pdb.

[buzzer]

Hi PDB my carriage is Polish and has independent suspension on air bags, the wheels have no tubes ad are filled with expanded foam so no punctures, will take some close up pics to show you the set up. You can get done for drunk in charge of a horse and many traveller men use there horses to go to pub, the horse usually knows its way home as mentioned on here before and the landlord would load the punter up and let the thing loose to find its way home.
When we are at the café the horses just stand, cant feed them with a bit in there mouths and have loads of people want to say give an apple or such and I bring it home and let them have it when finished.
Remember driving my first LHD truck but think once you have done it for a while it never leaves you, far better when on long continental journeys and a lot safer, harder to go back to a RHD I think. We have had left hookers for years now and we do find them easy to sell on after there life with us as most get exported anyways.
TB test looming on Tuesday and its forecast to rain aint it always the way, cheers for now Buzzer.

[saviem]

Hello all,

Buzzer, really enjoy this thread…just a few memories from the past…

Love your driving outfit, I always wanted to drive , but never have. Lost my old lad before Christmas, and simply cannot recover from it, Horse, plus man, equals a bond stronger than anything…Now Im “boarding” a sweet little Mare, and an abused Donkey…but it a`int the same!

Long time back you were talking about how the Horse would always find its way home…Now my late Grandfather, 1881/1979, spent his whole life with Horses, first as a canal boatman, then just buying and selling them. Boy he had an eye for a “high stepper”…I remember as a boy going to Banks`s Brewery in Wolverhampton in a trap to collect spent Grains for his Pigs behind something that should have been running at Aintree…good job there were no speed cameras in those days!

1891 he was sent by his father who had boats on the broad Cheshire canals down to Gorsebrook Road in Wolverhampton to collect a new Horse, carrying £5 to pay for it, in his shoe!..He slept the first night on the “Stop Planks” at Gnosall, on the Shropshire Union, then when he collected the horse late the following afternoon, he was going to ride her back to Ellesmere Port, but the Stable Keepers wife made him go to sleep in the Stable, until the next day, to avoid him , (asleep), being “brushed” of the Horses back, under some Bridge Hole, and to drown in the Canal.

When he retired from the Shropshire Union in 1927, (having worked through the General Strike of 1926), he gained employment as a Drayman, for the LMS Railway company in Wolverhampton. His Dray had a little Mare to pull it, and because she was so fine boned, he always walked along side her, rather than riding on the Dray. He was a big man, well over 6 foot, but not fat, and one story that I am so proud of…He was delivering across the road from Wolverhamptons quite regal Art Gallery…(we did have some fine buildings …once)…when he stopped his Dray, as there was another Carter “thrashing” his horse…my Grandfather walked across the road, took the Carters whip, broke it into two halves…then handed it back to him!..

When in (I think), 1978, Renault instigated its “Raid Economic en Europe”, with TR305 tractors, and Savoyard Tilt Trailers @ 38 tonnes gtw, I was able to do the leg up to Birmingham `s National Exhibition Centre…after the hullabaloo had subsided, and the great, and good had retired to some grand" bun fest"…I was on my way back to Lyon, (and the end of Europe for me)…

So I picked my Grandfather, and Uncle, (the Haulage one, for whom I had traversed the European continent for), and took them for a little “jog” around the country roads…My Grandfather , as I helped him down from the cab said, " You missed quite a few kerbs on the tight turns…well done", …and my Uncle said…" I always wondered why you took so long to get back from Sicily…you drive slowly"…

Families, you can never win!

Cheerio for now.

[buzzer]

Well for the last three days I have turned out my horses in the paddock and boy are they enjoying a nice bit of doctor green as we call it, nothing better for a horse but will make the ■■■ sticky for sure. The ground has dried considerably after five days with no rain, amazing how it changes. It is still a little damp in places and I always worry when they charge round and may pull a shoe off which is a pain, and cut up the turf but the chickens soon sort that out.
Like your input Saviem, people forget that years gone bye we did every thing with horse power, sometimes wish I were born 70 years earlier even if the work was harder think everybody appreciated things more back then and we still had seasons for different produce not like today when you can go to a super market and get stuff any time of the year.
Now off on my rounds to get papers, veg, straw and haylage ready for the oncoming week Buzzer.

[wrighty]

Not all our destinations are picturesque, here is a photo taken at a rendering plant near Widnes…

Cheers Wrighty.

[peggydeckboy]

Wrighty what on earth is waste milk, waste !-milk! never why, would diary’s have waste milk, after all the trouble a cow as gone to, then the farmer ,then you hauling it, then the diary , as the world gone mad it does not make sense. explanation please, will this affect the in or out vote?

also, I do not know if you have seen my comments on tanker drivers ,that I will not retract it is no way! in this world about you and your diary gang on agriculture you men are a different breed…

[buzzer]

PDB when I first past my test class 1 in Cornwall we used to do a lot of milk powder, this was a by product of butter making. When all the fat solids had been removed for the butter making process the skim milk as it was called was put over hot rollers and instantly dried into a powder form which was bagged up in waxed bags to prevent damp getting in. We did a lot of palletised loads of this stuff from this MMB plant and let me tell you it was an art to keep that load upright on a trailer, split hook roping was essential. Once had a load slip and I pulled into services on the M4 heading for my delivery to Kent, the load had bulged and was in danger of slipping of the trailer. Another driver suggested I wait for one of the lads coming from South Wales with a coal tipper and ask him to gently back into it with his trailer, this is what I did and it worked a treat and saved me a load of agro, after extra ropes I was on my way and made my destination without a hitch, another Mary Hopkin’s moment cheers Buzzer.

[buzzer]

PDB had to edit that doubl post, Buzzer.

[wrighty]

Evening all,

It is very rare for milk to be disposed of, the load I had on today had black bits in it so was no use, only other reasons for dumping milk are antibiotics or if it’s going off,
Just out of interest where did you take your milk powder to in Kent Buzzer, we used to do a lot into South Darenth I think it was a firm called Gibbs & Ball ?

Cheers Wrighty.

[peggydeckboy]

Buzzer, Cornwall, my you got about, pasties man then ,y ou aint got one of the black and white flags hiding have you. with a cross on…".we be emmets then"lol
you were lucky with that milk powder to small al bags was the problem 1cwt sacks would have been better.
Bags of fert were the same unless loaded correct. or compost mind you, all pallets now arnt they.

[kmills]

Wrighty, that wouldn’t be Croda Colloids at Widnes would it?

[buzzer]

wrighty:
Evening all,

It is very rare for milk to be disposed of, the load I had on today had black bits in it so was no use, only other reasons for dumping milk are antibiotics or if it’s going off,
Just out of interest where did you take your milk powder to in Kent Buzzer, we used to do a lot into South Darenth I think it was a firm called Gibbs & Ball ?

Cheers Wrighty.

Wrighty come to think about it was I believe Darenth into store, but when I got me own Albion super Clydesdale 16 tonner did a load every Monday one pallet to an Italian ice cream place on the north circular road in London and the other 9 ton to Ski Yogurts near Norwich and back load ware potatoes from Norfolk. They always gave you a tray of yogurt which would have gone off by the time I got back to Cornwall so I always traded this for a dinner in a café which worked well.
Any ways that load I did on the Guy Big J to Darenth I will never for get as I had a rider of 160 crates of spring greens on top of the sheeted load of milk powder and this went in to old covent garden market, had driven all night leaving at teatime the day before and when I got to market it was already heaving and could not get near the stand so the chap in charge said I send the barrows round to collect which they did 13 on each load, the last geezer signed me up and gave me a quid for breakfast and of I went to Kent, half way through unloading which was handball on to an elevator I had to go and answer the phone , I thought it was the gaffer with my reload instructions but no, it was the trader in in OCGM and all I heard was him shouting down the phone where’s my fackin greens, well I had been done good and proper and the only thing green there was me, never again and what else was odd when I turned up the chap said alwight John and I never been there before, scratching me head I thought how the hell does he know me name but as I progressed through life I realised they called every one that, hey ho all in life’s experiences on the road, cheers Buzzer

PDB w used to tonnes of fert from Avonmouth and also Billingham for Dorchester transport, this either went to store in Petersfield or Fordingbridge, we did this as a return load on French SCAC trailers. Not sure if we really were allowed to but we did and an easy load with just a fly sheet or if fine a tipping the same day no sheet at all.

[kerbut]

That load looks familiar JD, I had 2 on for Dorchester Transport doing the fertilizer from Avonmouth

[franglais]

kerbut:
That load looks familiar JD, I had 2 on for Dorchester Transport doing the fertilizer from Avonmouth

If i remember correctly some of that fert ex Avonmouth went into a depot at Thruxton? (A303 near Andover).

[buzzer]

Good loading in Avonmouth with three fork lifts you were done in no time at all and they had a large canopy for you to get under to sheet if it was raining IIRC Buzzer.

[franglais]

If my memory serves, we put a half pallet on the front to keep the weights correct. Had to “unpeal” the bags as they were stuck with blobs of a brown adhesive to stop the plastic sacks sliding? Seem to remember that, but `twas a while back!

[wrighty]

kmills:
Wrighty, that wouldn’t be Croda Colloids at Widnes would it?

Grannox at Widnes, we used to do a lot of fertilizer out of Immingham back to our store at Claughton, and a lot went direct to farms, which could be fun with a 45ft tautliner…

Cheers Wrighty.