On 16/08/2014 19:20, Tim Lamb wrote:
.....
Otherwise they were displaced in 1941 when the War Ag committee required
suitable grassland to be ploughed and provided tractors and machinery to
do the job....

With 50,000 tractors in Britain at the start of the war, our farming was
already among the most highly mechanised in the world. The increase to
150,000 tractors by the end of the war was part of a massive planned
change to what we produced at home, aimed at reducing the amount of
shipping needed. In 1938, we bred nearly half the meat we ate, but grew
only 20% of the cereals. During the war, beef cattle virtually
disappeared from Britain, in favour of growing wheat and oats, which
were actually described as ship saving crops.


--
Colin Bignell