Shadows Of War

AUCHONVILLIERS, FRANCE - APRIL 2013: An unexploded World War One shell in a field near Auchonvilliers, France. The iron harvest is the annual "harvest" of unexploded ordnance, barbed wire, shrapnel, bullets and shells collected by Belgian and French farmers after ploughing their fields along the Western Front battlefield sites. It is estimated that, for every square metre of territory on the front from the coast to the Swiss border, a tonne of explosives fell. One shell in every four did not detonate and buried themselves on impact in the mud. Construction work, field ploughing and natural processes bring the rusting shells to the surface. Most of the iron harvest found by farmers during the spring planting and autumn ploughing seasons is collected and In Belgium, iron harvest discovered by farmers is carefully placed around field edges, or in gaps in telegraph poles, where it is regularly collected by the Belgian army for disposal by controlled explosion at a specialist centre near Houthulst. (Photo by Tom Stoddart/Reportage by Getty Images)