The Compulsion

Comments from the public on that part of the the Sheffield Moors Partnership process dealing with 'Sustainable Land Management' show such a wide variation of points of view that it is simply not a 'sustainable' position to say that things should now go forward and the officers construct a master plan. At the very least there should be another local process involving genuine consultation within which some examination of these views takes place.  Anyone considering that the officers of the partnership have the capabilities of Solomon to steer a path through this have more faith than is good for them and us.

One or two of the comments raise the question of a possible cull of the deer illustrating a compulsion and a misapprehension often found. This is the 'everything must be controlled tendency' that is common in managers and farmers and sometimes taken up by others who have responded to scaremongering often  presented by people with a very limited view of what's going on. Leaving aside for the moment the vexed question of farm livestock it's worth considering the numbers of deer seen on Blacka. Last year and previous years in April and May deer were often to be seen in numbers up to and even over twenty.

Later in the summer these numbers declined as the animals moved around in smaller groups. Some people, thinking they have seen a lot of deer consider them as if they are fenced in like cows, concentrating their impact within an enclosure. In fact I looked out for deer many times from June to August and was disappointed. But such is this compulsion to control and cull that some people only need to see a large group and they think there is a serious issue. This perception is something the managers are prone to encourage because it serves their purpose - to show that management should always be around to step in when necessary.

This year too the numbers of deer have been high during spring. And it helps that they have the place to themselves at least until the demon defecators are installed. Then perhaps they may move on     -    noses in the air.

Buttresses

This could be the area SWT refers to in its A4 laminated notice thanking us all for not disturbing the lapwings last year.  I call this part of the pasture land The Buttresses. Lovers of trees avoid it and I can't remember when I last saw anyone at all walking here.
I was wondering why (if you want to get a reputation for being grateful, that is)  you should wait as long as a year to thank people for doing something you didn't ask them to do in the first place? Something to ponder.

Further across is a lonely tree. That's sad I think.

Aren't there things like dating sites available now? But anything companionable would soon be gobbled up by the woolly strimmers. The sheep themselves are now back in their enclosure with the exception of those that escaped and those that have found their way onto the grassy verges and even tarmac of the A625.

The lambs look smarter than some we've seen in other years with a creditable ethnic balance and the ewes too. This one is an exception though whether it's mange or the latest poodle-style fashion I can't say.

Years ago I used to see so many lapwings on farmland before the industrial scale farm management drove out all but a small residue of wildlife. The ones I remember would like the ploughed and harrowed fields where no grazing was happening and, there being so many of them, determined people would wander over looking for plovers eggs while the birds would dive around peewitting several at a time. The eggs were difficult to find and its unlikely that this had a major impact on populations. So it was modern methods of farming and food production that contributed to their decline and doubtless pesticides too. Now the wildlife trusts seem keen to manage this land with farm animals when it is public land with no necessity of being involved in food production except for the whacking great grants from the CAP. BBC's Farming Today slipped in an item yesterday telling us that farm incomes were going along very nicely thank you despite the recession. Now, now, that's not allowed - farmers with nothing to complain about?

Doing Different

As mentioned in the previous post SWT's cattle are shortly to appear and use Blacka as their latrine. The discourse around this policy of devour and defecate has its amusing side. One source of entertainment is the response you get when you ask why. It usually takes the form of telling we sad ignorant people that "our landscape was formed many thousands of years ago by complex processes among which was the influence of large herbivores". I used to hear this a lot. It's getting so we don't hear it so often now. That may be because word has got through even to the conservation people that we now have a good supply of wholly natural unfarmed large herbivores on the moor so that explanation won't wash any more. They've had to re-think their mechanical response in the light of the deer's presence. The current favourite is "cows and deer do different things". Once again we come up against the command and control approach of those who have drawn up their blueprint and must impose it whatever the consequences. We know that they will always find a role for managing.

That was the compact promised them when they were indoctr trained in their university courses and which they implement using business study diplomas. "We are indispensible." That is the message. They are no different to any other groupprotecting their own role. How did the natural world get along without them, their newspeak, their interventions and their grant applications in the early days of the earth?

Doing different is something that visitors to Blacka will concede in one respect. (number two in fact): you may have to explore for some time before finding what the deer leave behind them. No such difficulty with the cows.

Propaganda

When Sheffield Wildlife Trust pins notices on Blacka you’re advised to read between the lines and with imagination. There’s usually more than a little imagination gone into the writing of them. With SWT the assumption must be that every statement is spinning a story they want you to believe in order to massage your perception of themselves as an organisation. So nothing should be taken at face value. All is part of a constructed narrative for the unwary to swallow.

They have put two notices up on the gates. One is the dreaded one we knew was coming but just hoped it wouldn’t appear, the one telling us they are bringing their ‘crop & crap cows’ onto the moor, their anti-nature storm troops. We’ve examined this sceptically over the years and there’s not much more to say apart from that it’s pretentious nonsense.

The other is this one.

What it suggests to anyone coming fresh to it might be this.

Last year, near where people walk with their dogs some lapwings have bred. The dog-walkers had co-operated with SWT. It would be really appreciated if other dog walkers who didn’t know about this made their dogs behave as well.

This is being economical with the actualité to say the least. If the lapwings bred on Blacka (and it’s possible, about as possible as that SWT might sometimes tell the truth) they did not nest anywhere near the places that dog walkers – and really all other visitors – go. They may have bred at the far side of an adjoining area known as the inby land that most people probably don’t even consider to be part of Blacka. It’s the cropped grassy enclosure usually full of boring sheep and covered with their smelly faeces. People don’t enjoy walking there and would struggle to find a decent place to sit down never mind have a picnic. It would be a long way from the bridleway and there is only one other path from which any of the few passers through rarely deviate. There is very little to attract most people although there are badgers and hares and, at the moment, wheatears.

Two years ago SWT dug some scrapes especially to attract lapwings so they want to be able to say it’s been a success and it may have been. I did see a quite large group of passing lapwings at the top of the pastures on two occasions but I rarely returned partly due to a foot injury and partly because it was so unpleasant unlike the previous year when they had problems with their sheep and it was covered in wild flowers. I might have expected to see signs of more regular ones but could have simply missed them

I specially like the ‘Thank You’ bit. It’s promoting a narrative of co-operation between the public and SWT which they hope will translate into more supporters and the idea that they’re good eggs after all despite their incompetence and insistence on messing up everything they do. But then some newer visitors could not be aware of that.

Ox Stones

This weather was not the best for visiting Houndkirk and Burbage. But then Blacka Moor had managed to please even under mist and drizzle earlier in the day when some excellent birdsong from warblers had cheered us up. Even at home the valiant blackbird and others were charming us from the rooftops and telegraph poles. This time I went to the Ox Stones, a feature in an otherwise drab expanse of heather which comprises Burbage Moor. My opinion has not changed. The place is an indictment of the conservation bureaucracy as feeble and blindly failing to distinguish between that which is worthwhile and that which is frankly a waste of space.

What a scandal this place is. I saw no sign of any wildlife at all unless you include the sheep droppings. You might think it barmy to imply sheep have anything to do with wildness but that’s just what the Sheffield Moors Partners did in their vision-defining awayday in July last year when they talked about the ‘wild and open’ and ‘natural’ landscape. To think of the history of the English language and the development of literacy and we now have people in fairly senior posts presumably well paid who happily debase the words we use. Should we compel them to eat a page of the English dictionary each morning?

These moors have value in proportion to what you are doing on them rather than having h any beauty or dignity of their own. Walking across them with a companion you can enjoy a good conversation; on your own you can be thinking out the wording of an essay or turning over a tricky problem in your mind. Once you start looking at the scene itself you realise that its character is more a lack of character and the best thing is to go back to talking to yourself. The precipitous rocks of Burbage Edge and Stanage are popular of course as cliffs and steep hills always are. But at and around them are miles of dreary moorland populated with miserable looking sheep – places that the game industry would love to get their hands on. The best way to thwart them is to allow nature to reclaim it encouraging a variety of other wildlife to move in.

Have you noticed that the people who manage these places don’t visit them for 11 months of the year? They only come in August. Just look at the photographs in their websites and publicity material. They portray a place where the heather is always purple. They have to do this because there’s nothing at all special about any other time of year. Every day it looks the same, quite unlike a landscape with trees which constantly changes.

As I approached the Ox Stones, the only distinctive thing around, I sensed something that I remembered from one of the earliest memories I had about Stanage Edge some 40 years ago. There was a cold north east wind but it was sunny: a good place to sit down admire the view to the west and eat our sandwiches would be those rocks where we would find shelter. The place stank from many yards away with sheep urine and all ledges were covered with faeces. This is now referred to as ‘iconic’. The Ox Stones also provide sheep shelter and it shows.

As I said all that these featureless livestock lavatories have to offer are places to do something else in, preferably while moving through them quite briskly. So without the radical changes that are necessary and unlikely to come from the conservation industry another 20 years will see them used more and more by people intent on speed and thrills – there’s nothing else for them to think about up here. Hence the bikers and motor bikers and 4X4 drivers and joggers who you'll be likely to meet up here. Those who seek natural beauty will continue to be disappointed if they’ve not died out themselves as a species.

Under the Weather?

Not the best picture of a cuckoo and he's not the best cuckoo. At least his call is not the classic pure two-tones we expect. He clips the second note and sometimes sounds as if he needs a throat pastille. But this has been a poor May for spring warmth. The last few days there have been at least two cuckoos around one of which is a much better vocal performer.

Stewardship

Environmental Stewardship earned by farmers and landowners for putting sheep on the land is justified because of the public good that it delivers, or so it's claimed. As the brakes screeched and the horns sounded when these woollies chose to dash across the fast A625 Hathersage Road one might have concluded that helping to reduce the number of motorists on the roads was part of that public good.

It's quite possible that many more of them will have found their way onto the grassy verges when they see what this group have discovered. Responsibility for these animals is shared between Sheffield Wildlife Trust, the farmer (who lives some 20 miles away) and the Dark Peak branch of The National Trust. I've let SWT know about this several times but as they've put a block on my emails bouncing them back as 'undeliverable' I can't know if anything's got through. I've now told them using a different email and that seems to have worked.

Of course it's possible they are all too busy to deal with such mundane and tiresome everyday tasks as looking after your farm animals, being sat at the desk working out if the acreage of the grass verges along the road can be claimed from Rural Payments Agency and Natural England as part of Higher Level Stewardship.