Jeremy Clarkson has admitted he’s having ‘sleepless nights’ over health issues impacting his farming work.
Clarkson, 63, has been sharing his farming endeavours with fans since Clarkson’s Farm debuted on Amazon Prime in 2021.
He never expected his efforts would become the basis of a hit show when he bought the land 15 years ago, having recently told LADbible: "I mean, the truth of the matter was that land almost never comes up for sale round here.
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"And 2008 was the big financial crash, and this came up for sale, and I just thought, 'Nobody's making more land, so it's as well to buy it.'
"And it was going, nobody would call it cheap, but cheaper than you'd imagine."
But we’ve been fascinated by the motoring expert’s journey at Diddly Squat farm in the Cotswolds - which, in recent years, has presented various challenges, from planning appeals to ‘abuse’ local from villagers.
In his latest column for The Sunday Times, Clarkson said his health is also something that worries him when it comes to farming.
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“There’s a lot of jumping involved in farming,” he wrote.
“You spend a great deal of time hurling yourself off gates and trailers and straw bales, and that’s fine when you are 14.
“But like almost every other farmer in Britain these days, I’m in my early sixties, and so are my knees. Which means that while I can get on top of things, I can’t jump off them any more for fear that my legs will bend the wrong way and that’ll be that for six months.”
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He said he has a ‘similar problem’ when he drops something, saying in the past he’d just ‘bend down and pick it up’, but that his ‘back’s no longer really up to that’.
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Clarkson continued: "And on top of the physical issues, which will only get worse, there are financial problems too. And they’re going to get worse as well.
“Because the grants and subsidies that I used to get from the EU, to recompense me for selling food at a loss, are dwindling until, in three years’ time, they will dry up completely.”
He said health woes, paired with financial concerns, are what keeps him up at night, adding: “These, then, are troubling times, because what am I to do? Farming hurts my back and my knees, and if I attempt to use my land to grow food, I’ll lose money. It has been causing me some sleepless nights, that’s for sure.”
Last month, Clarkson said he also finds it hard to sleep the night before his pigs die, having recently had to give up seven of his male pigs to slaughter.
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“I can never properly sleep the night before they go, and all the way to the slaughterhouse I have what feels like a hot cricket ball in the pit of my stomach,” he shared in a previous Sunday Times column.
“And then when it's finally time to say goodbye, I always become a little bit unmanly.”
But don’t feel too bad for Clarkson since he decided to avoid telling porkies and said despite the sadness and sleepless nights, he’s quite looking forward to tucking into the meals from his pigs.
He wrote: “I know that I’m trying to be a farmer and that this is what farmers do. And I know I will enjoy the bacon and ham and pork chops that result.”
He continued: “But it’s not easy, taking seven happy, healthy pigs, from their woodland home to their deaths.
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“Especially as pig prices are currently so low I’ll almost certainly end up making a loss on the transaction."
Topics: Celebrity, Clarkson's Farm, Jeremy Clarkson, Health
Jess Hardiman