Don't call her a farmer's wife...

As Clarkson's Farm returns to our screens, JANET HUGHES meets hard-working Devon dairy farmer Lorna Burdge who's driven by a desire to show people the real face of farming in the 21st century

- 

WHEN Harriet Cowan temporarily stepped into Kaleb Cooper's muddy boots as Jeremy Clarkson's sidekick in early episodes of the latest series of Clarkson's Farm, there appeared to be widespread amazement that a 24-year-old, petite, blonde, female who liked to wear make-up and curl her hair could also repair fences, plough fields and know the best cattle to buy at auction.

Many fans of the popular Amazon Prime series, which follows the trials and tribulations of the former Top Gear host at Diddly Squat Farm in the Cotswolds, appeared to be astounded that the young nurse had also been doing traditional 'men's work' on the family's farm in Derbyshire.

Not Lorna Burdge. As a dairy farmer in Devon she knows first-hand that the old-fashioned image of women spending their days at the aga making hearty meals for menfolk coming in from the fields and doing nothing more strenuous than collecting eggs and bottle-feeding sickly lambs at the hearth have long gone.

Lorna may be married to a farmer called Jim and live on a dairy farm with their three children in an idyllic part of the West Country, but whatever you do, don't call her a farmer's wife. Well not unless you want to be told that she is no more a farmer's wife than Jim is a farmer's husband and everything on their farm is shared 50/50.

"A few years ago a woman said to me 'Isn't your husband lucky that you can pop out and help him from time to time,' recalls the no-nonsense former Colston's Girls' School pupil. "When I said 'I own half the business' they just said 'you know what I mean.

"I said 'No, I don't know what you mean. It's my farm, it's my business, I own half of those cows, I'm not just popping out to help."

Having their own tenanted farms is a dream come true for Lorna who enjoyed a rural outdoorsy childhood in Wraxall, North Somerset and studied agriculture at university, doing relief milking shifts on a neighbouring farm during the summer holidays.