Reverting to acres

[Agrivator]

Now that we seem likely at last to be free of the shackles of the EU, can we start a petition to revert to acres?

Acres are part of our culture. Hectares are not part of our culture.

 

[AvonValleyFarmer]

Now that we seem likely at last to be free of the shackles of the EU, can we start a petition to revert to acres?

Acres are part of our culture. Hectares are not part of our culture.

I only ever talk in acres anyway. As does everyone else around here.

 

[Lincs Lass]

And cwt, pounds, ounces, feet and inches

 

[yellowbelly]

Now that we seem likely at last to be free of the shackles of the EU, can we start a petition to revert to acres?

Never moved away from acres in the first place. Still spray in fl oz/pints an acre, top dress in cwts/acre

 

[JP1]

Stones
Chains

Tin baths
Gas lights
Genuine horse power


The list is endless

 

[Grouse]

What’s a hectare anyway - isn’t that a Jerry term ? For Ve haf veys of steeling zee acres

 

[CharcoalWally]

And can we stop sending children to school? Can we please send them back down the pit where they belong?

 

[Tarw Coch]

I’ve voted yes but really I’m in favour of freedom of choice.
I think in acres, any dealings in land be it sale or rent are in acres and the local contractors charge by the acre ,

 

[marshbarn]

I have every faith in all that the brexiteers have promised, higher lamb prices and higher beef prices and higher corn prices.
The end to crop assurance, and the hedge cutting ban to lifted in August .
My faith in these promises are true as in regard any other thing that comes from London

 

[nick...]

Prefer acres as we have more of those but hectares etc easier to work in with along with kg,litres etc
Nick...

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

Australia and NZ couldn’t be farther from these “shackles” yet when I started school there forty odd years ago everything had been fully metric for a good few years.

The switch to decimalisation in currency / metric system in Australia in the mid-sixties (currency) and early-seventies (metrication) was perhaps a sign of “freeing shackles” from England.

But I think everyone realised the metric system (and decimalised currency) was generally just much easier to work with and for the metric system was the basis of the international system of measures. Much in the same way that English had become the de facto international language of trade and relations.

Acres still persisted for a long while, especially for a generation that was used to them.

I still think in acres, and to a lesser degree, feet and inches, but for weights and measures its kg and litres. Stones, gallons etc just seem completely unnatural to use and cumbersome to calculate with.

 

[ewald]

As a middle aged/ almost old farmer I was brought up with the imperial system and have a sentimental attachment to it. But for everyday practical use, metric just works. Everything is compatible with everything else, mistakes are less likely. I still look out of the window at the 25acre, and work out barley yields in cwt /acre, but when I get on the sprayer kg/ha is very much the order of the day.

 

[Jackov Altraids]

I think historical reasoning is pointless, metric is better in most respects but I am sure that if a fair study was done, people making guesstimates using inches/ feet / acres would be far more accurate than anyone using metric because they are a much more 'useful' sized units. That was how / why they were created.
Imperial use persists in agriculture because it is generally of more practical use.
Large farms would probably use metric because it works better if you have field sizes over 20ha. It wouldn't be that they are so much more 'advanced' but referring to your 5 and 6 acre fields as 2.02 and 2.42 just doesn't cut it.

 

[tinsheet]

Acres here, as do most others, never hear hectares unless it paperwork

 

[Highland Mule]

Acres are easy of course - just got to learn your 12 (inch/foot), 3 (foot/yard), 22 (yard/chain) and 10 (chain/furlong) times tables. So much easier than those pesky decimal units.


Imperial should be consigned to the same bin as WRM and all his cohorts.

 

[Highland Mule]

Acres are easy of course - just got to learn your 12 (inch/foot), 3 (foot/yard), 22 (yard/chain) and 10 (chain/furlong) times tables. So much easier than those pesky decimal units.


Imperial should be consigned to the same bin as WRM and all his cohorts.

 

[britt]

I think historical reasoning is pointless, metric is better in most respects but I am sure that if a fair study was done, people making guesstimates using inches/ feet / acres would be far more accurate than anyone using metric because they are a much more 'useful' sized units. That was how / why they were created.
Imperial use persists in agriculture because it is generally of more practical use.
Large farms would probably use metric because it works better if you have field sizes over 20ha. It wouldn't be that they are so much more 'advanced' but referring to your 5 and 6 acre fields as 2.02 and 2.42 just doesn't cut it.

But then aren't American acres and gallons a different size to UK ones.

 

[Jackov Altraids]

But then aren't American acres and gallons a different size to UK ones.

Yes, but I'm not sure how that's relevant to my point?

 

[BigBarl]

If we go back to acres why don’t we go the whole hog and move back to square wheels and living in mud huts? As a younger person in Ag I totally understand a hectare is 10k m2 but I couldn’t possibly tell you what an acre was other than reverting back to 2.471 of a hectare. I voted ‘no’ by the way...

Space added!

 

[Highland Mule]

Acres are easy of course - just got to learn your 12 (inch/foot), 3 (foot/yard), 22 (yard/chain) and 10 (chain/furlong) times tables. So much easier than those pesky decimal units.


Imperial should be consigned to the same bin as WRM and all his cohorts.