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Welcome

Old Pond Publishing Ltd are publishers of DVDs and books for enthusiasts in the land-based industries: farmers and smallholders, workers in the earthmoving, forestry and heavy transport occupations. We deal with current activities and machinery as well as the history of the industries. We are based in Ipswich, Suffolk, UK.

The Books or DVDs pages are probably your best starting point in this site. You can order securely directly from there or you can access more detailed information about particular books and DVDs and their authors.

You will find books and DVDs on the following subjects: Classic Tractors, Vintage Tractors, Model Tractors, Traction Engines, Garden Machinery, Trucking and Earthmoving, JCBs, Ploughing, Working Horses, Bee Keeping, Duck Keeping, Organic Farming, Sheepdog Training, Goat Keeping and Husbandry, Poultry Management, the History of Agriculture … and much more.

Our DVDs, books and other items are easy to buy. You can buy any of them online from this site in complete security. Or if you prefer, you can telephone us on 00 44 (0)1473 238200.

Enquirers from Canada and the United States of America should note that our programmes are produced in PAL format. If you wish to play our DVDs on a machine that cannot accept this format you should order them directly from the Ontario-based company Diamond Farm

If you are searching for a former Farming Press title, please click here

For those who would like to keep track of what's happening (or not happening) at Old Pond Publishing, why not visit our Blog at www.rogergsmith.typepad.co.uk

 

 
Recent Publications
Strong Farmer: the memoirs of Joe Ward Ciaran Buckley and Chris Ward
Strong Farmer: the memoirs of Joe Ward - Ciaran Buckley and Chris Ward
Ciaran Buckley uses interviews which Chris Ward conducted with her father Joe to view recent Irish history through the lens of one prominent family. He brilliantly weaves together the threads of history and family memory to tell a tale of farming, politics and unbreakable family ties. ...more
Working Tractors Volume One Presented by Stephen Richmond

Working Tractors Volume One - Presented by Stephen Richmond
Stephen Richmond and Jonathan Whitlam have been making tractor and machinery programmes for over eleven years. They have now started releasing material from their extensive back catalogue. ...more

Farming Diaries: a life on the land - Presented by Stephen Richmond Farming Diaries: a life on the land - Presented by Stephen Richmond
68-year-old John Want shows how he runs a 350-acre arable and cattle farm single-handed. He has been on the farm all his life and first of all tells Stephen how his mechanisation has advanced over the years....more
A Romance of Engineering - National Library of Scotland A Romance of Engineering - National Library of Scotland
This archive DVD comprises four films made for Scottish engineering companies. Men of Iron (c. 1947), A Romance of Engineering (1938), James Watt (1959) & Story of a Steel Wire Rope (1946) ...more
Cruachan: the hollow mountain - National Library of Scotland

Cruachan: the hollow mountain - National Library of Scotland
Two archive films dealing with hydro-electric schemes in Scotland. First, from 1952-56, the construction of the Glen Moriston dam by the Mitchell Construction Co. The second film, Cruachan (1966), covers the construction of the ambitious pumped-storage hydro-electric scheme at Loch Awe, Argyll....more

Massive Earthmoving Machines Part 4: mountain movers : Steven Vale Massive Earthmoving Machines Part 4: mountain movers : Steven Vale
The large, specialised machines in this programme have one task: to move mountains. In the Fabero coal mine, northern Spain, you can see a 520-tonne Hitachi EX5500 hydraulic excavator making light work of overburden. This beast feeds 200-tonne capacity Cat 789C trucks in just three or four passes. Nearby, a Komatsu D475A dozer – the biggest in Europe – is ripping through rock. ...more
Land Girls Gang Up Land Girls Gang Up - Pat Peters
Pat Peters and her Land Girl comrades worked as hard as any man, clearing stones, pulling thistles and cutting broccoli on freezing cold mornings. For this gang of high-spirited young London girls, suddenly transported to rural Cornwall in the 1940s, it was the unending potato harvest that they most disliked.
...more
Scania at Work: LB110, 111, 140 & 141 - Patrick W Dyer Scania at Work: LB110, 111, 140 & 141 - Patrick W Dyer
In the 1970s nearly every driver acknowledged the Scania 141 as the King of the Road. It was the most powerful truck of its day, the favourite for long-haul work throughout Europe. It set a standard for other manufacturers to match and it created a premium image for Scania that still persists. ...more
Cattle Lameness and Hoofcare Ice Road Truckers Season Two - The History Channel
Ice Road Truckers has returned to our screens for a second high-tension season, but this time the job takes them even farther north, 100 miles inside the Arctic Circle. They are here for a new mission: to haul the heavy metal of natural gas drilling rigs not only on frozen rivers but also over the Arctic Ocean! ... more
Training Gundogs: techniques in action - Paul Rawlings Know your Combines : Chris Lockwood
Farm machinery enthusiast and photographer Chris Lockwood shows a representative sample of the combine harvesters which are most likely to be seen working in Britain’s fields. In general he has featured modern combines – though there are also one or two classics – and he shows several models from the most widely seen makes. ...more
Footsteps in the Furrow : Andrew Arbuckle Footsteps in the Furrow : Andrew Arbuckle
Would you like to know why they used a wheel-barrow to catch pests in the turnip field? Or where they spread fish – much to the delight of the seagulls; or where you might have found ‘loupers’? You will find these and hundreds of other facts from a farming heritage in this book. ...more
Demolition Giants - Steven Vale Demolition Giants - Steven Vale
The technology of demolition has changed beyond all recognition over the past two decades. The dust-raising ball and chain have gone, replaced by telescopic high-reach extensions to tracked machinery. In this programme you can see some of the world’s tallest demolition machines at work in Holland and the UK. ...more
First Steps in Border Collie Sheepdog Training: from chaos to control First Steps in Border Collie Sheepdog Training: from chaos to control - Demonstrated by Andy Nickless
One of the beginner’s main obstacles to training a sheepdog is that he or she has to control the sheep while at the same time encouraging the dog to go around them. The time-honoured way to do this is to use an experienced sheepdog to keep the sheep in the centre of the paddock. Andy Nickless bases his training on containing the sheep without the need for the second dog. ...more
Know MORE Sheep
Know MORE Sheep - Jack Byard
Know MORE Sheep is a companion to Jack Byard’s first book: Know Your Sheep. This second book takes in the first-cross Mule sheep you will find on your walks in hill-farming country as well as some of the rarer breeds and recent imports to be found across the United Kingdom. ...more
Second Helpings: Henry Brewis
Second Helpings: Henry Brewis
Second Helpings is the third collection of stories and verses written by Northumbrian farming humorist the late Henry Brewis and read by Brewis himself. Originally recorded in the 1980s and released on audio-cassette, Second Helpings is now being made available for the first time on CD, re-mastered. ...more
Know Your Sheep - Jack Byard Ax Men: the Complete Season One - The History Channel
From the producers of the acclaimed series Ice Road Truckers comes another winner! You probably found the Ax Men programmes one of the most gripping series on television in 2008. Made by the The History Channel, it brought you the day-to-day lives of dedicated Oregon loggers in intimate and thrilling detail. ...more
Know Your Sheep - Jack Byard Steiger Part Two: 4WD Tractor Pioneers - Peter Simpson with Toy Farmer magazine
This programme interweaves two Steiger archive films of 1974 and 1977 with filming and interviews from 2008 to show the second half of the Steiger marque’s life. ...more
JCB’s Backhoe Loader: Workhorse for the World - Tim Starkey-Smith
Peter and Pauline at Hollyhock Farm - R.A.E. Linney
In this reprint of a book from 1951 nine-year old twins Peter and Pauline go from the city to the farm and learn about the countryside. And they find hidden treasure! ...more
JCB’s Backhoe Loader: Workhorse for the World - Tim Starkey-Smith
JCB’s Backhoe Loader: Workhorse for the World - Tim Starkey-Smith
On all sorts of construction sites, in road-building, on farms and estates, everywhere you go all over the world you’ll see a JCB backhoe loader at work. The principles of the machine were laid down in the 1950s, yet successive developments have kept it at the forefront of its market. ...more
Britains Farm Model Balers and Combines 1967-2007
Britains Farm Model Balers and Combines 1967-2007 - David Pullen
David Pullen describes all the baler and combine models produced by Britains since they were first added to its product range, and provides details of their development. As well as the standard models he gives details and photographs of rare and prototype ones. ...more
The Moon & the Sledgehammer
The Moon & the Sledgehammer - Directed by Philip Trevelyan
Aptly described as 'bizarrely entertaining', this 1971 documentary gave glimpses of a family cutting itself off from the world nearly forty years ago. Mr Page and his grown-up children Kathy, Nancy, Jim and Peter, lived in six acres of woodland near Heathfield, Sussex (south of London). Water was from the well. There was no electricity or gas. ...more
Massive Earthmoving Machines Part 3
Massive Earthmoving Machines Part 3: Aitik copper mine, Sweden - Steven Vale
The third in Old Pond's 'Massive Earthmovers' series deals with just one mine - but what an exceptional mine it is. Boliden's Aitik copper mine, north of the Arctic Circle in Sweden, is a hole 3 kilometres long, 1 kilometre wide and 400m deep. ...more
 
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