Free From..

A beautiful morning but constant reminders that 5 years ago Icarus asked us what it was about Blacka that we most valued. When it came to my turn I replied that there were many things and it was hard to choose. But, anxious to steer towards the key things at issue, I said that my local supermarket had an aisle called Free From - usually gluten and other allergenics. Blacka itself had for many years been free from farm style management, farm animals, farm fences and farm clutter. Well in combining all the ideas into an overall consensual vision this one hit the buffers at the start. The conservation workers in another group got rid of that ruthlessly with no chance for me to rescue it. Now this morning, 5 years on, the freedom is different. We've had the freedom of the conservation people to erect fences and walls, and put plenty of sheep and a number of cattle in the pasture land through the winter as well as summer. They've had freedom to defecate where they can find a space and have made a bid for their freedom, escaping onto the moors, where a group of sheep have been for a week because the fences have not been properly maintained. Even one of the highland cows had broken out this morning.
And there's been the freedom to leave farm clutter and litter around - this morning's being a ruminant's food bag prettily displayed in a tree.

It's odd how touchy the conservation lot get when you point out that sheep have escaped. When I mentioned sheep getting over the fence more than a year ago I was told the ones I had seen were from another farmer. Oh no, said I, we saw them get out. No couldn't have been they said. And the warden at North Lees who's about as unreconstructed as they come was quite ill tempered about it. It's something to do with the conservation industry having a sketchy relation with the truth.