The cast

Farmer Green runs the farm. He planted the first seed, he mends the fences, and he has never once sold an acre. You will know him by the laugh first: a big, stocky man with a grey-brown beard, rosy cheeks and a round red nose under a wide brown hat. White shirt with the sleeves rolled up, a blue bandana, patched green overalls, one fist on his hip and a pitchfork in the other hand.

He keeps to the barn with the Black Bull most days and walks out to look over a farmer’s plot when things are quiet. He laughs easily and worries about nothing: a sell-off is weather, a bear raid is a bad afternoon, and a green candle is the best thing he has ever seen, every time.

He has opinions, and he shares them in a speech bubble when something big happens: a whale buys in, someone leaves, someone comes back, the farm reaches a new era or graduates to the pool.

On a big buy

“Now THAT is a green candle!”

On a sell-off

“Just weather. The crops need rain.”

When someone leaves

“Safe travels, neighbour. Your plot will wait.”

When they come back

“Look who’s back! Kept your plot warm.”

His motto

“Only green candles on this farm.”

Four log folk live on the farm. They sit around the campfire, which burns in the middle of the farm at first and later beside the barn. By day, when trading goes quiet for a while, two of them get up and stroll between the plots. At night they all come back to the fire.

They are also the farm’s callers. When a cluster of trades lands at once, one of them calls it out: “+5 buyers!” or “-3 sellers…”.

A grinning table gallops in from one edge of the farm and out the other every half a minute or so, and again whenever a wave of buyers comes through. During a rodeo, three tables circle the barn until it ends.

Capsules are the farm’s visitors. One bounces by the barn whenever someone rings the bell. At graduation they ride in on the train, hop off and party by the barn. A plush capsule pops up beside the bull when someone pokes him, and some farmers grow capsules as their crop.

Bears only come with a raid. When selling turns into a rout, three to eight bears pour in from the edges, more the harder the selling. They prowl the plots until the raid is over, then run off.

Chickens peck about by the barn in sunny weather. Flocks of birds cross high over the farm, butterflies drift over the crops on fair days, and two ducks paddle on the pond, leaving ripples. None of them care about the market. They are there so the farm never stands still.