On 3 Aug, 21:43, Dave Hill wrote:
On 3 Aug, 17:32, "





wrote:
On Aug 3, 5:14 pm, "Bob Hobden" wrote:

"judith.lea wrote ...

I want to buy Edward a tiller for our new veggie garden in France, at
the moment it is a field! He mentioned Howard Gem in a conversation a
few weeks ago, anyone know anything about them?

Judith, can't you ask one of your French farmer neighbours, if you have any,
if they would plough the field for you. Friends of mine get help from their
neighbours in return for the odd English cake and fruit from their trees.

Thank you Road Hog and Bob. I have not explained adequately. Lauren,
our lovely neighbour farmer was asked by us if we could buy or lease
some land from him next to our garden to make a veggie garden. He
said we could mark out what we wanted and use it free so it is not an
entire field!!! It will just be a veggie garden but Edward's back is
not as strong as it was hence the tiller. Lauren will plough it, I
was thinking for subsequent years and as Edward has a birthday coming
up, a tiller is in order. Thank you and Road Hog for great advice.

Judith

I have used a Howard gem on and off since I was about 18 yrs of age.
They are great machines, but very heavy to use as you get older.
About 5 yrs ago I bought an Italian 2 wheeled tractor A Pasquali, I
have a 30 inch rotovator, a 1.15m grass cutter bar, A ride on trailor
(a real godsend)
Just wish I had had it years ago,
Whilst it isn't as good as a Gem for breaking new ground, it is much
quicker to get the ground ready as it so much wider, and the grass bar
means I can cut all our grass in just over 2 hours, instead of around
5 with the rotary mower, and it doesnt matter how long the grass is.
The item I would like to add is a rotary plough.
The advantage of these 2 wheeled tractors is that they are a power
unit, and you can get a wide range of attachments for them from snow
plough, to chipper, saw bench to rotovator.
Tryhttp://www.pasqualitractors.co.uk/http://www.tracmaster.co.uk/Ridger_Attachment.htm
I am sure both of these could put you intouch with a dealer in your
part of the world.
David hill
Abacus Nurseries- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

My former employers retired our Gem at the same time as I retired last
September - they say health and safety won't let 'em use it. The truth
is theyr'e scared of it so they gave it to me as a retirement present.
I suspect there are quite a few aspects of the machine that H & S
wouldn't like.
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/rodsgarden/party0007.jpg
That's me with my minder in the background.
They are/were superb machines but not for the faint hearted but if you
grew up with them as I did, nothing else will do. There are certainly
more user friendly safer and more versatile modern machines available
at a price but when things get rough the Gem beats them all. I'm
waiting with interest to see what my successors use to do the rough
ground preparation on the big new piece of garden we got out of the
derelict woodland we've been clearing over the last three years.
I've converted my personal veg patch to deep beds so in fact the Gem
might be on ebay sometime in the next year.