Farming Nick Green

from Issue 8 - Volume 18 - Mendip Times

What’s On

Maintaining a balance on the land

ITseems people are becoming more aware that farmers actually look after the countryside they manage. Over the last few years there has been a call to let the land around us rewild. Whilst the aspiration in many peoples’ minds is laudable, if things are left to run wild, the countryside rapidly runs to rack and ruin with a decreasing level of decent habitat and zero ability to produce food.

Burrington Combe is a great example. Over the last hundred years the combe has gone from a bare limestone gorge to a treelined route from the Wrington Vale to the top of the Mendips. I remember easy access to Burrington Ham 30 years ago.

Since then, it has become overgrown with scrub. Without the cattle and goats grazing, these two areas both would have become an impenetrable mass with no access for walkers, reduced habitat for the birds and mammals which use open vegetation and a significantly reduced ability for the area to sequester carbon due to the grass cover dying off.

There are other things of interest which require management to maintain their historic and up-to-date significance. The numerous dew ponds dotted around Mendip are a case in point. Without the owners maintaining them they become overgrown, fall into disrepair and are no use to the farmed animals and wildlife they are intended for. With NICK Rather than rewilding, British farmers need to be encouraged GREEN and paid to farm with wildlife in mind. It’s not a lot different than what has been on offer through Countryside Stewardship, Entry Level and Higher Level Stewardship over the last 30 or so years. What farmers shouldn’t be encouraged to do is abandon “proper” farming and let their farms revert to the wilderness of the Middle Ages when there was only three million people to feed. The dry stone walled uplands grazed by sheep and cattle producing beef and lamb need to remain. The lowlands grazed by dairy cattle producing milk for the dairy products many of us enjoy need to remain. The wide plains being the bread basket of the UK need to remain as do the deep soils of the Fens producing our vegetables. It’s all about balance and that is exactly how farmers want to work.

Nick Green is Farms Director for Alvis Bros Ltd based at Lye Cross Farm. As well as the business, he is involved with a number of local and national farming charities.

Quality entries at annual fatstock show

FROME Livestock Market enjoyed another highly successful annual fatstock show with quality entries all round. The Frome Fatstock Society also presented a cheque for £500 to the Dorset & Somerset Air Ambulance having Emma Bruce, representing Dorset & donated £500 to Cancer Somerset Air Ambulance, with Karina Heritage, Frome Fatstock Society president Research UK earlier in the year. Young farmer Percy Clatworthy took the Supreme Championship with his Limousin heifer selling at 415p/kg to Wayne Pullen Butchers. of Milborne Port. Archie Hill, of Shepton Mallet, saw his Champion Beltex lambs sell at £200/head. The champion pen of pigs sold at £310/head were shown by Miss H Loveless of Bridport.

Cattle auctioneer, Greg Ridout, said: “We can always do with more to satisfy demand driven principally by a number of butchers who regularly attend the market and are always looking to buy the very best.”