Ullswater community are farming for our future

Our Chief Executive, Richard Leafe joined the Ullswater Community Interest Company for a day. Take a read of Richard's day in his blog below.

The day was chilly, drizzly, with low cloud, when I recently spent a morning with Danny and Maddy Teasdale who run the Ullswater Community Interest Company.

Since the devastation of Storm Desmond in December 2015, Danny has been slowly and steadily, working with the grain of the local farming community to recover nature, restore carbon and build back flood resilience into the landscapes of the Ullswater valley.

We looked at:

• boundary fences restored to hedgerows
• re-meandered becks to slow water flow
• woodlands extended with new trees.

I was impressed with Danny’s understanding of both the physical geography of valley and the farming systems that operate within it. He brings the perfect combination of knowledge, enthusiasm and an ability to quietly persuade farmers and landowners in the valley to come with him in driving this revival of wildlife and landscape enhancements.

As is often the key to success, Danny and Maddy rely on the collaboration of volunteers, agencies and funders to support this important work.

I’m delighted that we in the Park Authority can contribute to this mission though our Farming in Protected Landscapes Scheme. We have two more years of this Defra supported scheme and I’m looking forward to seeing how we can support Danny further as well as in other places across the park where people are looking to follow his success.

It’s vital work right now, to encourage our traditional hill farmers to restore nature alongside their work to look after our World Heritage landscape and rare breed livestock.  From talking to Danny it’s clear that many farmers see this as right way to go, and with their help we can spread the word and do more for our natural environment and our net zero ambition.

I know there are many other organisations across the park working to make our ambitious plans for farmer-led nature recovery a reality. The Rivers Trusts, Cumbria Wildlife Trust, RSPB, Woodland Trust,  and the National Trust to name a few, are all very active across the national park, an approach coordinated through our Partnership.

As we drove through Matterdale, Andrea, our Farming Officer, commented how beautiful the landscape looked on that dull February day. She was right. But the next time I spend a day looking at farmer-led nature recovery, I hope the sun might shine.