Mission

Every morning the cows have been at the top of Thistle Hill standing out against the morning sky like a collection of misplaced monuments. Perhaps they have been sent there with a management mission to defecate over any edible mushrooms that might be appearing, and then to kick over the prettier waxcaps?

At least their absence from the moor has given the ground there a chance to recover. It’s also given some space for deer to start to return.



So why were the cattle moved? My guess may be wide of the mark and may be doing SWT an injustice but I would wager several CAP euros on it being accurate. If it is an injustice it's one that's eminently deserved; if they decline to tell people what's happening and even when they do we can't trust them and they show no commitment whatsoever to transparency and accountability, people will make their own judgements based on past experience. The real reason could have something to do with the disgusting mess the cows  were making near the gate. Why would SWT bother about that? They never have before. Well it's the end of the Countryside Stewardship 10 years and SWT want to have another even more lucrative scheme starting soon - Higher Level Stewardship. Nothing must stand in the way of that. After all SWT's main mission in life is to garner as much grant money as they can. And seeing as a complaint had been made to Natural England that cows on site had led to sundry examples of rank uglification on land intended for public recreation all paid for with funds distributed by NE,  the local NE officer was about to visit and take a look.  So what did SWT do? Insisted that the NE officer only visited with the SWT manager present and then made all sorts of excuses that the visit would only be convenient at such and such a time. And that visit was delayed several months until they had pulled the cows off for a fortnight, a warmer spell of drier weather had allowed the cow-puddled paths to recover, evidence of trampling of bog asphodel was faded and to cap it all the sun was shining and the heather in bloom. Don't we just love managers?

The reason that the cattle were taken off the moor and planted in the sheep enclosure remains unknown and anyone inquisitive enough to ask SWT is likely to get the usual response, i.e. what they want you to believe rather than what is accurate. You wonder why such a simple thing should be the cause of misinformation but that’s the way their minds work. They once answered a similar question three different ways to three different people. It’s a longstanding fear with them that the simple truth could damage them, probably because they are aware of misjudgements and cock-ups so by default launch into cover-up mode: it’s a way of trying to stay in control by giving nothing away and confusing the public in the hope they’ll go away in frustration. Their model is the South Yorkshire Police of 23 years ago.