Newsletter - Spring 2023
Written by Jonathan Tunmore, County Coordinator

What's been happening at Normac...

After 22 years at Normac, Chris Thomas handed the reins of County Coordinator over to Jonathan Tunmore at the AGM held at Easton College in mid-February, Chris has shown enormous dedication and devotion to his post over his tenure for which we are very grateful.

Jonathan grew up in north-west Norfolk in the village of Grimston during the late 1980s, and spent countless hours watching and riding in the tractors, predominantly John Deeres, operated by local farming company, F. K. Coe & Son. His adult career in agriculture began at Wootton Marsh Farms on the west coast of Norfolk in 1994, where, working initially as a YTS student, he was once again mingling with John Deeres.

From there he went to Nocton Farms in Lincolnshire as a trainee manager for two years, driving Case-IH Magnums and Ford 10 and 40 Series tractors. A spell in the Fens followed as assistant manager for R. P. Worth & Son, which mostly operated John Deere 6000 Series tractors, followed by three years as harvest manager for organic growers Pollybell Farms in South Yorkshire.

In 2006 he moved down to the Suffolk coast where he was onions and organics manager for James Foskett Farms for seven years, followed by a year contract spraying and Avadex spreading. Since 2013 he has run Ratatak Ltd, an agricultural pest control business, but still finds time to operate a combine on 2400 acres every summer. His exposure to John Deeres throughout his diverse agricultural career has left him partial to the green and yellow machines, although thanks to early memories of a Fiat 1880 DT, MB-trac 1100 and Fendt Favorit 615 LS he's also got a keen interest in these continental brands.

Jonathan currently owns a varied collection of modern classics consisting of 4 rubber track Cat Challengers, 1968 D8 22A, 1940s D2, 2 Schluters, Favorit 512C.

Along with Chris Lockwood, Jonathan is also one of the founding admins of the Facebook page 'Farming in the Modern Classic Era' which has grown at a tremendous rate since it started back in February 2017, it now has a membership of around 32k.

In addition to this, Jonathan appears in Classic Tractor Magazine in the feature 'Suffolk Bunch' a 5 page feature following the farming adventures of 5 friends as they go about their day to day farming and contracting lives.

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