Issue #9 The Miscellaneous Adventures Digest

A quiet, cold week, thoughts on conservation and an anniversary gift.

After a very news filled week last week, this week has been much less newsworthy which has actually been very pleasant. The weather has been quiet and cold; just right for getting out and about. We have had some trouble with our van so we’ve not travelled far, but happily we can find small adventures just around the corner. It had snowed a little on the higher tops of the fells over the weekend so we headed up one of our local crags to get a good view of the snowcapped peaks. The mountains always seem much bigger when covered in snow, to me at least. We had hot soup at the summit, huddled behind a boulder to shelter from the cold wind. Nothing fancy, just tomato soup from a tin but everything tastes much better when you’re out in the elements.

Looking north from our local crag towards Scafell with its head in the clouds on the left and Bowfell in the middle.

I’ve been out working on nature reserves this week, both on areas of limestone pavement which is a totally different geology to that closer to home. It’s a strange landscape of exposed, grey, flat chunks of limestone scarred with deep fissures and channels which are known by the wonderful name of grykes. It’s a habitat that I know very little about but I’m enjoying learning about the trees and plants that grow there and how the landscape has been managed in the past. The plant communities are similar to the chalk grasslands back down south, nutrient poor, thin soils support a diverse range of wildflowers and I’m looking forward to visiting these spots in the summer for a bit of botanising. Our work involves removing non native trees and re-spacing birches and hazels that are encroaching on areas of species rich limestone grassland. One of the sites was, until recently, a forestry plantation of fast growing timber trees; western red cedar, larch and spruce. These plantations are typically a disaster for the sensitive native flora and fauna which get wiped out by the dense shade cast by the timber crop. Apparently, in order to get these species to grow on the thin soils, peat was cut from lower down in the valleys and transported up to the limestone crags, then stuffed into the grykes before the trees were planted, completely disrupting the fragile ecosystem. I’m always staggered by the willingness of humans to modify the landscape to the detriment of nature in exchange for cash. If only we could learn to appreciate the innate value of nature and its beauty rather than always seeking to extract and exploit for financial gain. Thankfully, Forestry England are slightly more enlightened these days and are working with other stakeholders locally to restore the limestone habitat and improve biodiversity as part of their management of these sites. It seems most practical conservation work is undoing the mistakes of previous generations; I wonder if the next generation will be thankful of the work we’re doing now or if we will have got it wrong too?

Burning brash has meant at least we had a fire to keep us warm on the cold and snowy days this week…

In other news, you may remember that last week we celebrated the anniversary of our first year in the lakes and we were delighted to receive a lovely gift through the post from Emily of This Way. Emily also celebrated her own year in the lakes recently (also moving from Sussex!) and produced a zine to commemorate the occasion. Part diary, part walking guide, it contains 12 hikes to follow and monthly reflections on her new life in the north. It’s a lovely thing and available to buy here. Thank you, Emily!

One Year in the Lakes by This Way

We’re busy making new wooden and fabric things and hoping to get our store back up and running in the next few weeks. Let us know if there are any products you’d like us to make, or old favourites to bring back (you can see some of our own favourites in the archive here).

That’s all for this week, we hope you have a great weekend.

Warm wishes,

Andrew, Emma and Benji x