THEY began to arrive just after dawn. A full three-and-a-half hours before the auction was to get underway, the first cattle were unloaded from their trailers. After a year and a week away, there were some farmers who were keen to get an early start.

The nightmare of foot-and-mouth may be over - although this week's scare in North Yorkshire provides a reminder of how easily it could return - but its legacy was all too visible. Every vehicle depositing or removing livestock was sprayed with a high pressure hose, and buckets full of an unpleasant-looking yellow-brown liquid stood at the entrance to the pens, along with stern notices requiring all who passed to wash their boots.

Not quite back to normal at Darlington Farmers Auction Mart, but at least it was back.

For many farmers, the suspension of the marts, just a few days into the foot-and-mouth outbreak, was a two-pronged blow. Not only did it take the bottom out of the market for their livestock, giving them no alternative to the price offered by wholesale buyers, but it also deprived them of a break from the solitary life that is the lot of many who work the land.

This lack of human contact has hit some particularly hard, and Jim Layfield is unafraid to admit he is one. Bringing 40 sheep to yesterday's auction, the 64-year-old, who farms at Hamsterley in Teesdale, had been in the habit of coming to the mart every Thursday.

"It was part of a weekly routine. There is only me and my son on our farm and when you're living with somebody there is not a great deal of conversation," he says. "It has had an effect and I have had to go to the doctors with it.

"It is just because you can't come out and sell stuff like you have been used to, and not mixing and not being able to organise your farm."

Jim's farm was the only one in the surrounding area not to be taken out during the foot-and-mouth cull, and even that he puts down to a mistake, forgotten by the Ministry. But, in many ways, he feels it would have been better if his animals had been lost.

'At one stage we were pleased, but then we went through a period when we wished they had gone. People who had been taken out were a lot better off financially. It has made it harder. When a neighbour had the disease, we were expecting them for a week to come out and cull the stock. My wife stopped answering the phone it was that bad.

"Some days are better than others. I can go ten days and I'm alright and, all of a sudden, I can be sitting down and I hear the beasts shouting and it just hits me."

As the sale time of 11am approaches, the caf and yard outside the auction rooms begin to fill. Farmers who have not seen each other for a year, and had been used to meeting every week, greet each other and exchange news. But, while the mart may be back on, it is still far from a normal turnout.

Auctioneer George Potts puts much of this down to the 20-day rule, which forces farmers to keep new stock on their farms for 20 days before it can be taken to mart. Some are also reluctant to dive into what is effectively a new market, letting others dip their toes in and test the price.

The last sale at Darlington before suspension last February saw 280 cattle and 1,800 sheep come under the hammer. Yesterday's auction saw 49 cattle and 350 sheep change hands. "It is good to be open and it is of paramount importance to farmers - it is the only transparent way of fixing a price," says Mr Potts. "But it is going to be difficult and it will take time to get back to where we were before."

Norman Simpson, who farms at Butterknowle, near Bishop Auckland, had brought five bullocks to sell, looking for around 90p a kilo. He was in no doubt over the benefit to farmers of reopening the marts.

"It is grand. We can't do without auction marts. A lot of people have been sending stock direct to the slaughterhouse all along, but if you haven't the mart, you have nothing to put a bottom in for price," he says.

"The slaughterhouses have been giving us what they think but, if you bring them to the mart and you're not content with the price, you can bring them home. But, if you sent them to the slaughterhouse and you're not happy with the price, you can't bring them home. They've had their throats cut."

Still farming at 70, Norman has been coming to mart for more than 50 years. "I only come if I have anything to sell, but a lot of farmers go to so many marts a week, and that is their holidays. They would rather go to two or three marts a week and meet people than go on holiday. You get a bit of chat. You're on your own farming, unless you're on a biggish farm, and you don't get a lot of those any more, so you get a bit of craic at the mart."

At a few minutes after 11am, the sale finally gets underway, and after a breezy "Nice to see you all here after a long absence", from George Potts, the first bullock trots obediently into the ring, watched by around 50 farmers and buyers. Throughout the auction, with each beast taking just a minute or so to sell, the farmers keep up a constant chatter, seemingly oblivious to Mr Potts' patter, but taking in every price reached.

After three quarters of an hour, all the cattle are sold and Norman Simpson is content, as his beasts fetch between 90-99p a kilo. Attention switches to the sheep ring, with the buyers leaning over the rail as the stock passes underneath.

Bert Walker, watching as his son Brian, who farms at nearby Dalton-on-Tees, sells his stock, is surprised so few turned up. Also surprising is that foot-and-mouth has not dominated the ringside chatter. Perhaps after 12 months of it, few people want to talk of it any more.

"There has a been a bit of talk of foot-and-mouth and this suspected new outbreak, but mainly everybody has been talking about how the mart is going," he says. "People are pleased it is going again, and I think there is some optimism, although it will take a while to get going."

Just 25 minutes later, and the sale is over. George Potts is happy at the result - the presence of 14 buyers pushed prices up, unlike another auction in the region when just two buyers turned up.

But, while the reopening of the mart may just signal the beginning of farming's recovery from the dark days of foot-and-mouth, for farmers like Jim Layfield there is more than just higher prices at stake. "I'm over the moon to come here today," he says. "I only hope today is just the start."