This is the time of year that I normally buy a few beasts to finish over the winter. It is a job I am not sure I enjoy very much as I usually come home wondering why on earth I paid so much for them, but there is something very wholesome and right about going to the market.

I like the atmosphere of the ring, the auctioneer’s gavel waving about before being thumped down to complete the sale of another lot and the banter of farmers discussing the day’s trade. Where else would you see such a gathering like it? I suspect anthropologists would struggle to make any sense of it. It is a form of beauty contest (with the stock, certainly NOT the people) and it is a brilliant way to conduct a trade.

My mental arithmetic is not good enough to make me as shrewd as I ought to be and I find it difficult to concentrate on all the lots, such is the opportunity to get some “crack” (I mean conversation, not prohibited substances) with fellow farmers. Unfortunately though, arable farmers don’t have the same opportunity to get that social interaction, nor do they have the ability to market their crops in the same way as the auction market. Gone are the days of the corn exchange, but could we not reinvent this method of marketing our crops? Not only could there be some excellent trades done but the conviviality of the event would have huge merit especially if it gave farmers the opportunity to meet and exchange stories of success or mishap.

There have been two terrible farming tragedies within 50 miles of here very recently, where the circumstances of this terrible farming year possibly conspired in their very sad deaths. Perhaps any kind of opportunity for farmers to get together and chat might help alleviate some of the distress that many of us suffer.

Neil Thomson farms 607ha in partnership with his father and brother from Caverton Mill, Kelso, on the Scottish Borders, growing combinable crops and brassicas. Some of the mainly medium loam is let for potatoes, and the QMS Monitor Farm also has cattle and sheep.

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