Furrowed brows over why Port Grat’s sand was being ploughed
A TRACTOR ploughing up Port Grat raised a few quizzical eyebrows recently, as passers-by wondered why the sand needed to be arranged into neat furrows.
The sight is not an unknown one in the island, but no one is certain exactly why this driver would want to spend time ploughing a beach.
Farmer James Watts guessed that the farmer was cleaning his plough blades, or the mouldboard, which had probably become a bit rusty. ‘If it gets rusty the soil sticks to it,’ he said.
‘Normally when you finish ploughing the field and you’re going to put it away, you could brush some oil over it or put on a coat of paint.
‘He’s maybe left it outside too long.’
He added that a side-effect was that the ploughed sand would become softer, which might cause a problem for anyone trying to drive on the beach later on.
