It’s now been five years since we entered into a Countryside Stewardship environmental agreement on the farm, and fenced off a wide riparian strip alongside the River Lune. There were already quite a few trees in this patch – mainly oak, sycamore and rowan – but the livestock exclusion has allowed some to self-seed and regenerate. One of the rowans is now taller than me.
The farmhouse looks out over part of the strip, and we can hear a variety of birdsong coming from it. The gamechanger for recording what species are living there has been the Merlin bird ID app. I downloaded it last week and since then have been making recordings as I do my work on the farm.
