The glazed expression, irritable disposition and distant far-away look more commonly associated with Countryfile viewers is actually symptomatic of its reporter’s! The lid has been lifted a little more this week on the shadowy drug culture that surrounds the world of dull but begrudgingly necessary agricultural news reporting by the revelation that ace rambling reporter Ben Fogal had totally, absolutely and by complete and utter accident ingested LSD during a visit to a Gloucestershire pub.
A runner for the hit show (sources needed) said drug taking was rife “only the other day I caught John Craven doing a crack pipe behind a Straw-bale and Matt Baker has such a massive speed habit we have to run the film at half speed to make him speak normal”. Ben’s hallucinogenic trip came days after a 48 hour ‘Countrytrax’ rave on farm land in Wales was broken up by Police, one weary reveller told reporters he had seen James Wong "Eee’d off his face freehanding" to an hour long dance remix of "I’ve Got a Brand New Combine Harvester”.
From Dartmoor to the Cairngorms runners are expected to source the best gear you can buy for a pony and if they can get hold of one a monkey, even if this mean theft, “Vets now refuse to go on the show, while Adam Henson keeps them occupied talking about sheep dip, Common agricultural policy and dogging the producers rip off the horse tranquilisers, it’s terrible, really terrible…the drugs I mean”.
A freedom of information request revealed that the show’s whole budget had been spent on Glow sticks and Crystal meth for the reporting team but it isn’t just Clare Balding and Jules Hudson dropping acid tabs behind the cow shed. One Soundman spoke of the time he was forced into a Land Rover and pressured to do a shotgun Bong or be thrown off the show. “No one says anything, it’s just silence around the lambs…the deeper you dig, the uglier it gets…and you can dig pretty deep with a JCB”.