David Barton thatches cottages with his own straw, writes ELIZABETH EDWARDS

While many farmers were still keeping a watchful eye on their grain to begin harvesting, David Barton at Church Hanborough had already made a start with his machinery. David is one of several thatchers around the country who grow their own straw, and for this, the right time to harvest is before the grain is fully ripe and still slightly green, with the straw still supple rather than brittle.

He grows about 15 acres of a variety of the wheat-rye cross Triticale, a frequent choice for thatchers. This year's harvest has been a good one and David is pleased that after three weeks of early morning starts and late evening finishes he had his corn stooked up to complete drying before being moved to storage in his barn.

He is mostly able to grow sufficient straw for his own use each year, thatching roofs in all parts of Oxfordshire, which he has been doing all his working life.

"I got up on a roof the day after I left school - or perhaps the day after that," he recalls. He began by working for another local thatcher, who has since retired. The opportunity to grow his own straw came eight or nine years ago.

"My father-in-law said: 'What would you think to having a go at growing your own?' And that is what I did."

Thatching straw has to be harvested in the old-fashioned way. The ever bigger, faster and newer machinery will not be the right kind for the job. The smaller, slower and older type, working in a more traditional method, is what is needed.

David uses a Fordson Major tractor dating from the 1950s, and with it a Massey Harris binder.

The binder, manufactured in the 1930s, may have originally been pulled by horses. A change has been made to its cutter since its earlier days, being now about 7ft in length instead of about 5ft.

By late August the stooks were dry enough for David to begin threshing his corn, again with traditional machinery.

He uses two methods to produce the different types of roof material - long straw and combed wheat straw. For the long straw he uses a Ransomes, Sims and Jefferies threshing drum in a single process, while for the combed wheat a different make of his Marshall threshing drum is used, also has a Murch type comber. This two-stage operation leaving the straw of uniform length, stripped of leaves and tied in bundles.

It is a matter of some debate among thatchers as to which is the better roofing material, but the choice is usually dictated by the need to keep with the existing style of a property.

Although the straw he has harvested this year has been good, David has had some losses, with a few acres of his fields flattened during the midsummer spells of very heavy rain. "I think this is the most I have lost in a season," he said. "I have never seen rain like it. But there was nothing I could do - it was devastating. And what I have brought in is good."

Although not usable for its intended purpose, the straw can be found other uses such as bedding for livestock, and the grain, from both the thatching and bedding straw, can be fed to David's ducks and chickens.

Although this variety is a feed wheat, not intended for bread-making, a friend did try baking a loaf with its flour. "It made quite a tasty loaf," David said.

David is also generous to wildlife, with some of the crop that has not quite made the grade being left alongside the hedges so that birds can benefit.

"I love the countryside, and everything about nature," he said. He enjoys seeing the wrens and wagtails, the pheasants and in the evening the barn owls and various kinds of deer. He also likes to leave plenty of hedgerow cover for nesting.

As well as being busy with the threshing, once the crop is harvested, he has to plough to prepare the seed-bed for next year's crop.

"For this clay-type soil, generally the best time for sowing is about September. Ploughing, turning, cultivating, you have to look after the land. If you keep going over it, it saves all these sprays and chemicals.

"This year's crop really has been absolutely fantastic, and it's all about looking after things. To use good straw, you need to cut good straw."

David is one of two or three thatchers in Oxfordshire who have embarked on producing their own materials.

When it comes to the business of the thatching itself, thatchers will help each other out at busy times. He has worked particularly in North Oxfordshire and in the Berkshire Downs, where there are a good number of thatched properties.

Among two on which David has worked which catch the eye, are a cottage in Minster Lovell, much-visited by tourists, and, a few years ago, the Reading Room at Ewelme. The Reading Room was thatched with another type of material, water reed, not one grown locally.

Mostly he works on his own, but the office work is taken care of by his wife, Liz. He also has to keep an eye and ear out for weather forecasts at the critical times of the year, so that he can make the most of any approaching good weather and get ahead when the forecast is for not-so-good conditions.

This is not only when the crop is due to be harvested but also when the sheaves are still in the fields. But, whatever the complications, David is very happy with his working life.

"I lived on a farm as a boy and doing this is like a dream come true. Although it is hard work!"