Down on the farm - The somme, September 2014

[AMMOTECHXT]

On the way back from a holiday in Eastern France we spent a couple of nights in a bed & breakfast on a farm. I went for a walk around a potato field shortly before it was due to be harvested and found five blown HE fuzes and a few shrapnel balls. Meanwhile back at the farm B&B they were already harvesting potatoes and were having to employ two or three men to extract items that were not potatoes from the conveyor. Items such as stones, pieces of steel, artillery fuzes, empty shrapnel shell and a grenade. It had occurred to me that with so much mechanisation over decades, there might be very little to be extracted. How wrong I was. Again the photos have been inserted in a random order.

 

[Nabob]

Hi,
earlier this year a Mils grenade came to the Czech Republic from France with a truck of potatoes.
I wonder if it is some kind of special fertilization process
Bob

 

[millsbomber]

Some years back our local Sainsbury's took 2 mills to the scrap yard as thy found them in a delivery of potatoes, not sure if thy knew what thy was or did not want the store closed down,, the scrap yard realized what thy was and were dealt with quietly by the EOD,,,,,,, long gone are those days,,,,, Dave

 

[Spaceinvader]

That would be quiet the baked potato to find at dinner!

 

[Millsman]

I know a French Mills collector who gets most of his specimens from the local farmers when they harvest potatoes. He just goes along after they have done the sorting and takes a bucket or two home. At one stage he had a few hundred in his garden pond slowly soaking the dirt off.

Yes I know... that's the French for you!

John

 

[hicky1300]

In some areas the farmers/workers put `finds` in piles at trees & poles. BD teams drive around and asses & remove.