Plans for Turnastone Court Farm in Herefordshire - Spring 2014

THE LARK

THE COUNTRYSIDE RESTORATION TRUST

NEWSLETTER SPRING2014 | ISSUE No. 50

Plans for Turnastone Court Farm in Herefordshire Plus: Flying Squirrels and Harvest Mice on Lark Rise

Contents

Features The Lark is published three times a year by the Countryside Restoration Trust. The Countryside Restoration Trust is the UK’s leading charity promoting wildlife-friendly farming and campaigning for a living, working countryside.

We believe that wildlife is integral to good farming.

That philosophy is put into practice on over 1,500 acres of working farms, small-holdings and woodland across the country – where, alongside our tenants, we are demonstrating how farming and other sustainable land uses can co-exist with and benefit from a countryside rich in wildlife.

Our mission is to protect the farmed countryside, its wildlife, and the people with the knowledge and skills to look after it – and to communicate that together these represent a strategic resource vital for our future food security.

Patron: David Shepherd CBE Wildlife Patron: David Bellamy Environment Patron: Jonathan Porritt Patron for Dorset: Brian Jackman Red Squirrel Patron: Dr.Craig Shuttleworth Trustees: Robin Page - Chairman, Andrew West - Vice Chairman, Ken Gifford - Treasurer, Chris Knights, Zac Goldsmith, Robin Maynard, Tilly Smith, Annabelle Evans, Nicholas Watts MBE. Editor of The Lark: Laure Tordjmann

Flying Squirrels Harvest Mice on Lark Farm Water, Water Everywhere Turnastone Court Farm (Introducing new tenants, history, future plans, wildlife)

5 6 7 8

Regulars Chairman’s Thoughts 4 Director’s Report 12 Introducing our new Trustees 13 Financial Review 14 Fundraising News 15 Education 16 Diary Dates 18 Volunteer Page 18 Farm News 19 Merchandise 20

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Photographs and drawings courtesy of Chris Knights, Nigel Housden, Martin Carter, Anita Page, Mike Nelhams, Meg Jenkins, Brian Lavers, Gareth Boaz, Viv Geen.

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The Countryside Restoration Trust, Bird’s Farm, Haslingfield Rd, Barton, Cambridgeshire CB23 7AG Tel: 01223 262999 E-mail: info@countrysiderestorationtrust.com www.countrysiderestorationtrust.com

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THE COUNTRYSIDE RESTORATION TRUST NEWSLETTER

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News

The Chairman’s Thoughts 2014 – My first thoughts are “How do we keep the momentum going from 2013”. People are still writing in saying how wonderful they thought the London event was last October. But we mustn’t rest on our laurels, time marches on, the countryside is in crisis, made worse by our non-stop winter rainfall. Plus we still have a message to get over to anybody who will look, listen or visit (politicians, farmers, media people, Countryfile, birdwatchers) anybody and everybody with an open mind and who is concerned with what is happening to our countryside – its wildlife, its farming and its culture. To help get this message across, please remember the DVD we brought out last year showing some of our achievements. It lasts a full hour, and has been widely praised. Later too, we will have all the talks from the Royal Geographical Society event available, I hope, in a small booklet.

This brings me to both a confession and an apology. Last year I announced rather grandly, and prematurely, that I would bring out a book about the CRT – “The Skylark Warriors”. Sadly I seemed to be working flat out the whole year and failed to write it. I am going to try again this year, but already life is hectic again and I am acutely aware of all the letters and emails that I haven’t responded to from last year. In January Lulu and I went to Kenya on one of my writing projects, for only twelve days. When we got back home I had 500 new letters and emails waiting for me – apologies to all those who have not received a reply.

We were given huge encouragement a few weeks ago when Lark Rise Farm received a visit from the Secretary of State at Defra, Owen Paterson. I always speak as I find. I liked him and we had a very wide ranging and useful discussion. I hope he doesn’t get the sack now which is what happened to the last politician we got on well with – Richard Benyon. I still don’t understand that decision, but then I’m afraid I don’t understand Mr Cameron, or most of the other politicians at Westminster and Brussels.

To try to get our message across more clearly I hope that we will soon publish our “CRT Blueprint for Wildlife Survival”. This will explain what we have done so simply at Lark Rise Farm, a philosophy that can easily be adopted and adapted to any sort of farming set-up. It boils down to creating a mosaic of crops and

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conservation opportunities. It gives wildlife choices while at the same time it allows food production to flourish. With Britain’s population increasing at an absurd rate and with huge areas wanted for house building, we believe that ours is the only sane approach that can produce food and encourage wildlife. Some charities and quangos rattle on about “landscape scale conservation” – how can that work in a small, overcrowded island. Sorry, I believe a lot of the “landscape scale” stuff is, in reality little more than hype and marketing. The CRT tries to deal with reality.

Good news from our properties. At Turnastone we have new tenants, Gareth and Madeleine Boaz, and will be having an open day there on 22nd June. Theirs is a brave story. Madeleine’s father Edward was hoping to play a part in helping to get the farm up and running and was hoping to buy a house at the edge of the farm. Tragically, after spending a day working on the farm he was killed in a traffic accident on his way home. It was a terrible blow and how I felt for Madeleine and Gareth. I had met Edward, what a pleasant and hard working man with an enormous amount of energy and experience. Bravely Madeleine and Gareth have gone forward and we wish them every success at Turnastone. The CRT will certainly do all it can to help them in their first farm.

By the time this edition of The Lark appears we shall be interviewing for our first tenants at Twyford farm, Sussex. It is a beautiful farm and I hope we can do it justice. Again, we intend to hold an open day there at some stage during the summer so that you can all have the opportunity of visiting.

It is going to be a good year – I can feel it in my bones after the cold, damp winter. I am looking forward to seeing bluebells at Margaret Wood and Twyford Farm; smelling apple blossom and sipping cider at Awnells; seeing the wonderful Jersey cows at Pierrepont and experiencing the forest at Green Farm; then there will be lambs and red squirrels at Mayfields, and the Open Day at Lark Rise - if it is anything like last year’s, what a day that will be.

Then there are shows to attend with the exhibition trailer and talks and events to try and get new members – yes, it’s going to be another busy year.

News

Flying Squirrels

Photographs © Anita Page and Mike Nelhams

Have you ever seen red squirrels fly? I have – last September, when a remarkable collaboration between the CRT, Tresco Island, the British Wildlife Centre and the Royal Naval Air Service base at Culdrose in Cornwall saw twenty red squirrels land close to the Tresco Abbey Gardens, on Tresco, in the Isles of Scilly. That was the good news.

The even better news is that despite the appalling weather and huge storms around the Scillies, the squirrels appear to be doing very well and they are seen regularly in and around the gardens. The reason for the adventure was simple. Red squirrels need all the help they can get. Islands without grey squirrels can form a safe refuge, and if this works, then there will be red squirrels for reintroduction to mainland Britain, if and when circumstances allow.

So David Mills from the British Wildlife Centre in Surrey provided the 20 captive bred red squirrels. Mike Nelhams, curator of Tresco Abbey Gardens and his right hand man David Hamilton, picked up the boxed squirrels and took them to Cornwall and a RNAS Sea King helicopter from Culdrose landed on Tresco with the squirrels as part of a normal training flight. It should have been brilliant. In reality it was extremely worrying. I had been trying to co-ordinate the whole thing and had arrived on Tresco, with Lulu, to greet the new arrivals.

But the season of “mellow fruitfulness” turned to gales, driving rain and poor visibility – the helicopter and the boxed squirrels did not appear. Forty hours later the weather calmed and the helicopter

appeared. I was anxious. I was handed a box and felt movement and vibrations inside – the squirrel was alive. I felt quite emotional – what a relief. Robert Dorrien-Smith helped with the unloading too, his family has leased Tresco from the Duchy of Cornwall since 1830, and Robert embraced the idea of a red squirrel introduction as soon as it was mentioned.

The idea was almost instant release after just two days in an enclosure. Then the door was opened and gradually the eighteen squirrels (sadly two had died due to stress from the long wait) discovered freedom. It was a tense wait, but gradually, one by one they emerged, climbing, jumping and exploring with astonishing grace and speed.

Both Lulu and I found the whole experience very moving and it was a privilege to be involved with such a positive conservation effort. The news that despite the wild winter they appear to be doing well is very welcome. Later, in the summer, I will be returning with Lulu to the Scillies and I hope to report on the squirrels’ progress in a future edition of The Lark. In the meantime there are other possibilities to consider. Why can’t red squirrel havens be established on grey squirrel free Mull and the Isle of Man? In addition why can’t red squirrels be re-established in East Anglia?

Robin Page

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News

Harvest mice on Lark Rise Back in the early days of Lark Rise Farm, one of the local supporters was the formidable Jean Benfield, who has featured in the Lark before on account of being the proud host to the first pair of Barn Owls to breed on the land; sadly, she died about 8 years ago, but the site of that original nestbox, at the bottom of her garden overlooking the arable land, is still occupied by Barn Owls – although that original box had to be replaced. Among the many other things she did for the CRT, she bred and introduced harvest mice to the land. They clearly thrived in those early days, with regular sightings of their characteristic nests in the tree guards that were put around the new plantings of trees and hedges, and when Bob Stebbings did his small mammal trapping around the turn of the millennium, several were trapped. More recently, however, there have not been any such casual observations of nests (mainly because the trees have filled the space in the guards, or the guards have been removed), and our small mammal trapping has not recorded any, possibly because the abundance of field voles and wood mice nowadays means that a lot of the traps are occupied by these commoner species before the harvest mice get a chance to go in them!

Because of this, I was getting concerned that the species may have been in decline, which would cause us to re-think on some of our farmland management.

Harvest mice are on the UK Biodiversity Action Plan (BAP) due to their decline.

Although small mammals are far less well understood compared with our bird numbers, the Mammal Society have estimated an 82% decline in the last 25 years. One of the key components of the BAP is to improve the understanding of how numbers are changing nationally, and to this end, a monitoring protocol has been devised which is relatively simple to follow, and can be repeated year-after-year to give information on the local abundance of the species, and the data from each site can be combined to give a national trend in abundance, in the same way as we have for birds.

The survey was conducted in December. Instead of looking for the mice themselves – extremely difficult – the survey involves looking for the woven nests that they build for breeding and shelter. Come

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December these nests are easier to find, as the surrounding vegetation dies back, but they are unlikely to be occupied, so we don’t cause any disturbance. Later in the winter, the nests start to disintegrate. Two widely separated parts of the farm were chosen – a grass margin close to an area of bird cover and a hedge on Telegraph field, and the rough grass growing around the young trees of Millennium wood. These sites are about a mile apart. The survey technique involves marking up ten sections, each 10m long, through the best habitat in the chosen area, so a total of 100m of grassland is searched in each transect; each search area is a couple of metres wide, and searching lasts 10 minutes, plenty of time to inspect the habitat closely looking for what is, effectively, a bit of hay in a haystack! The nests are woven from dry grass, usually attached half way up the stems of grass and other delicate plants, in dense tussocky patches. Being so tiny (about the weight of a 2p piece) and agile, with a ‘fifth limb’ in the form of their prehensile tail, harvest mice can climb the slenderest of stems to build their little nests, which are no larger than a tennis ball, and often much smaller. I had very little hope that we would find any, after so few recent sightings, but with five keen volunteers prepared to do the search off we went.

With 10 sections to search and six people, it was logical for me to take charge of the paperwork, keep an eye on the time and roam around assisting anyone with identification of any nests found (voles, whitethroats and chiff-chaffs may build similar looking nests). I had marked the area out with canes beforehand, so the search was quite efficiently completed – much appreciated by all, in the cold winter weather. I could hardly believe it when, after a few seconds of starting the first search, Ray Thorne called out that he had found one! I rushed over and yes, he was right – a perfect ball of grass with a tiny entrance hole in one side. A harvest mouse nest! We found a total of 10 nests – some at both search areas – so the relieved conclusion is that harvest mice still thrive at Lark Rise. We also have some solid data to compare numbers now with future survey results, and our data goes to the Mammal Society to help bolster the national dataset. - Vince Lea

News

Bourn Brook, Lark Rise Farm, Cambs

Water, Water Everywhere!

What a wet winter. A winter in which much of the urban based media has forgotten the old saying “February Fill Dyke” and the dykes, ditches, rivers and brooks flowing over CRT land have certainly been full. People seem to forget that we are an island and islands can get great extremes of weather. Then there is “climate change”. There is such a lot of nonsense spoken and written about “climate change”. Climate has always changed and is changing – hence ocean-bed fossils at the top of the Cotswolds. In my lifetime I have known cycles of heat, cold, wet and dry. The reasons? I don’t know. All I do know is that our world is very fragile, as is the atmosphere that goes with it, and we should make sure that we act with care, consideration and above all, caution.

At Lark Rise, Pierrepont and Turnastone there have been floods – but on the flood plains where they are supposed to be. When there is rain, the flood plains become flooded – then when the rain stops the water levels fall – it is as simple as that.

Tim Scott at Lark Rise did get his tractor bogged down at one stage and a neighbouring farmer had to come and pull him out with a huge tractor, but no harm was done. At Pierrepont the River Wey flooded almost up to the garden wall of the farmhouse, but again no harm was done. The big sigh of relief was for the new dairy and cowshed – on a hill and out of harm’s way. If the cows had still been in the old dairy I think we would have been worried about possible seepage into the river. In Norfolk, at Mayfields, Sarah has had to use more hay and supplementary feed than she would have liked but she has survived and she does not start lambing for several weeks. At Turnastone the first batch of lambing is almost over and has gone well and so Gareth and Madeleine are pleased and the flood plain of the River Dore has produced no problems.

Elsewhere of course there have been problems and controversy.

I have spoken with several of the farmers in the Somerset Levels whose situations have been quite desperate. Some have had their houses and fields flooded and now their problems have been made worse as they are starting to lamb and calve. What makes the situation so bad is the fact that the worst of the floods could have been avoided if the rivers had been dredged responsibly and if some conservation bodies, the RSPB, Natural England and the Somerset Wildlife Trust had not been applying pressure on the Environment Agency to raise water levels. Research by CRT member, journalist

Christopher Booker, and his colleague Richard North, reveals a very sorry state of affairs in which the interests of traditional farmers have been almost entirely ignored because of “landscape scale conservation”. Sorry, with Britain’s population rising at a Third World rate and one million acres being made available for house building – yes, one million acres – 4% of England’s agricultural land –“landscape scale conservation” is not an honest option. The CRT is convinced that even in times of short term political ineptitude the practical way forward is by mixing farming with conservation – production of food and wildlife together - the mosaic style of conservation carried out so successfully at Lark Rise Farm. If this is not achieved then sorry – over-population is Britain’s ticking time bomb and wildlife is doomed.

In the sorry saga of the Somerset Levels it is clear that some of the worst decisions were made by the Labour “floods minister” Elliot Morley in 2005; he was the hobby birdwatcher who gave up Parliament for prison after seriously fiddling his expenses. Of course it is also a sorry fact that in massive flood wildlife is hit too – foxes, badgers, moles, voles, bumble bees and many more.

The East Anglian Fens had as much rainfall as the Somerset Levels but their drainage system that started seriously in 1650, worked - with tidal gates, gravity outfalls and dredging. The Somerset Levels, with an equally long history of drainage, without tidal gates and gravity outfalls and after stopping dredging, did not work.

The Levels were also hugely influenced by massive development at Bridgewater and Taunton. Surface water from these held up water flowing away from the Levels, causing it to “back-up”.

It is a case of horses for courses. In areas of long standing fen-type agriculture dredging and draining is needed. In lowland areas such as Lark Rise Farm we certainly do not want dredging. The brook spilling over its flood plain slows the flow and actually prevents flooding in residential areas downstream – in this case Cambridge. The classic case of too much dredging and drainage causing rainfall to flush off the land and flood houses is the Yorkshire Ouse above York, resulting in serious flooding in York. Sadly parts of York have again been flooded several times over recent months.

Unfortunately the one big thing missing from sad and soggy Britain over recent years has been common sense, as usual.

Robin Page THE COUNTRYSIDE RESTORATION TRUST NEWSLETTER

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PLANS FOR

TURNASTONE Turnastone Court Farm in Herefordshire’s Golden Valley was purchased by the Trust in 2003 for £1.2 million in order to save this wonderful farm and its ancient meadows from probable wide-scale cultivation. The farmland extends to 247 acres with the majority of this being permanent pasture.

Bordering the River Dore, some of the fields form a unique area of water meadows which have remained unploughed for 400 years.

These species rich meadows include ‘Trench Royal’ part of a threemile long irrigation channel completed during the Seventeenth

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Century by Rowland Vaughan. It is the earliest example of deliberately flooded water meadows to encourage the early growth of pasture in Britain and so an integral part of Herefordshire’s agricultural heritage.

Photographs Š Nigel Housden & Gareth Boaz

Introducing the new Turnastone tenants Gareth and Madeleine Boaz are the new tenant farmers at Turnastone.

Gareth grew up on his family’s mixed 500 acre farm at Huddington near Worcester, where he enjoyed the farming life especially lambing time when he would help his father with his 1000 ewes.

He also undertook all the shearing work and even did contract shearing for a time.

Madeleine grew up in Bosbury, Herefordshire. She also enjoyed the country life especially riding her pony Minnie.

Gareth and Madeleine met through Young Farmers where both were active members. Gareth took part in the Tug of War each year, his team making it to the finals at the Royal Show once. While Madeleine reached the position of Vice Chairman for her club and enjoyed taking part in some of the rally activities. They married in 2009.

With only 3 acres of their own and acquiring some rented land they started their own flock of sheep which reached the dizzy heights of 60 before they were successful in being offered the tenancy at Turnastone, where they now live along with their two collies, Zippy and Bess and Sam the Patterdale terrier.

They run a flock of 400 sheep including 11 pedigree Texel ewes and two pedigree rams. They have a vision of purchasing some Hereford cattle in the future. The farm is run traditionally with low inputs and many of the fields are now in the Higher Level Stewardship scheme. There are many plans for Turnastone and Gareth and Madeleine look forward to the future and working alongside the Countryside Restoration Trust.

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Photographs Š Chris Knights and Viv Green

TURNASTONE WILDLIFE

Curlew and chick

Lapwing

One of the biggest changes we have made to the farm at Turnastone since the CRT acquired it, has been to reinforce and rejuvenate the hedging layout, which has improved conditions for a wide range of wildlife on the farm. When we first got the farm, the hedges were sadly neglected shadows of their former selves and livestock had basically eaten their way through the bottoms of them. Anything within reach of a sheep or cow was eaten out, and the stock had free access across the entire holding. Fencing off the hedges has allowed them to rejuvenate from the base, and means that we can decide where the stock go and when. Further improvements have come through an extensive programme of hedgelaying across the farm, a traditional practice of hedge management.

With the protection of the fences, this encourages the hedges to produce a lot more base growth and the old gappy bare stems are a thing of the past. The newly invigorated hedges provide much better habitat for a range of farmland wildlife, such as nesting linnets and foraging dormice.

With the newly laid hedges all nicely fenced, we are able to control livestock access to individual fields and this means that one of the

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key principles of CRT farming is possible; creating a habitat mosaic at the farm scale. Previously, the whole farm was grazed to a uniform short sward but now it is possible to graze areas at different times, allowing some fields to grow up tall in spring and summer, suitable for hay-making. Other areas of the farm are wood-pasture, with a ground flora of woodland flowers so keeping the stock out produces a show of spring flowers like primrose, bluebell and butterfly orchids. So while the stock are in some less interesting fields, keeping the sward short, other areas have a variety of different heights, and this variety of heights provides a variety of different opportunities for wildlife; the more variety of habitat there is, the more diversity of wildlife that can co-exist on the farm.

A good example of how this habitat variety helps wildlife is shown by the waders that occur at Turnastone. The lapwings, which usually nest on cultivated ground where it is available (as their eggs are wonderfully camouflaged against stony ground) bring their chicks to feed in the short grass areas, especially if there is a proportion of wet area and animal dung which tend to attract a lot of insects for the chicks to glean. They do like to have some tussocks of sedge or such

10 years down the line, things are finally on the move at Turnastone. Since purchasing the farm in 2003, plans to restore the farm have been hampered by planning issues and the spiraling costs of renovating the buildings.

Work is about to commence on the listed barn by replacing the clay tiles and rotten timbers and lowering the floor. We have planning permission to convert the barn to a visitor/education centre and a farm shop. The long term plan is to restore all the barns and get them back into use either as holiday lets or small business ventures such as a micro brewery. Once these are completed it will provide a vital income to the Trust.

With the new farm tenants Gareth & Madeleine Boaz settled in, we are looking to form a new Volunteer Group to assist with the conservation work. Our wildlife monitoring officer will be continuing the excellent work she commenced last year. We will be holding an Open Day on Sunday 22 June when you will have the opportunity to come and see the progress for yourself.

like to act as hiding places should danger threaten, but mostly they rely on having very open habitats so that the adults can keep a look out for predators. On spying a potential threat, the adult birds usually respond by mobbing the aggressor, while the chicks make for the closest available cover and ‘freeze’. Having once helped round up a brood of lapwing chicks for ringing purposes, I can confirm that the very young bird’s camouflage is incredibly good. They tend to form a little cluster of up to 4 chicks, which put their heads together in the middle of the cluster, their camouflaged bodies forming a most un-bird like shape and the giveaway eyes and beaks completely hidden. This makes it difficult for a crow or fox looking for them, while the pair of adult lapwings constantly bombard them from above. A bit of sheep grazing in the wetter fields close to arable areas on the farm in the early spring creates the perfect combination of short sward, tussocks and feeding areas.

Curlews, on the other hand, rely on camouflage rather than aggression to protect their eggs and young. For them, tall grass is much more important; they can conceal themselves among it and incubate the eggs in safety. The adult birds use their incredibly

Photographs © Martin Carter and Nigel Housden

PLANS FOR TURNASTONE

long bills to probe for worms, while the chicks with their smaller bills pick food from the surface, but with longer legs from the time they hatch, they can cope with spending their early days in relatively tall grassland, looking for small invertebrates. These birds seek out areas that are kept stock-free during the spring, where the grass can grow tall; hay meadows are ideal for them. By the end of June or thereabouts, the young will be big enough to escape from the hay cutting operations, either by weak flight or powerful running – their legs develop very quickly. In areas where silage is made, which is often cut in May, most curlews will still be on eggs or have very small chicks, and the consequences are disastrous.

Having secured the various fields, we can now see which areas are most interesting to the curlews in the spring – usually the wetter areas close to the river Dore – keep the stock out, and hope that conditions are suitable for them to choose to nest.

Vince Lea

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Trust News

Director’s Report Much of 2013 was spent looking back and celebrating the achievements of the CRT over the past 20 years. Good though it was to look back, we mustn’t rest on our laurels, there is still much to do.

The highlight of the year was undoubtedly the event at the Royal Geographic Society back in October. It was great to see so many of you there with the auditorium almost full to capacity. The speakers and the Countryside Question Time kept the audience fully engaged throughout the proceedings and the programme ended with a performance from the superb Show of Hands. My thanks go to all the staff who worked tirelessly before the event and on the day to ensure the event was a success and ran smoothly.

We still have some copies of our 20th Anniversary DVD available, so if you haven’t ordered yours yet and would like a copy, please contact the office. The DVD is narrated by Robin and features clips from each of the properties. They are available from the office at £11.00 (inc p&p). The DVD also makes an ideal gift for friends and family and is an excellent way of introducing the CRT to others.

We have been busy planning for 2014 and now have the dates in place for the Open Days at each of our properties. You will find details of these on page 18. We have also booked the Exhibition Trailer to attend shows in Cambridgeshire, Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Norfolk, Oxfordshire, Surrey and Worcestershire. If you live in any of those localities and can spare a few hours to help us on the Exhibition Trailer, please do get in touch with Kenny MacKay our Events Manager.

There have been another couple of changes in personnel in the office. Rachael has retired and I thank her for her many years of sterling service, and wish her well in her retirement.

Caroline Aldersey has taken on the role of looking after our Friends and Memberships etc, along with the host of other things she already does. Liz Proctor our Fundraiser has also moved on to pastures new.

It has been a pleasure to work with Liz over the past few years, she brought a fresh enthusiastic approach to our fundraising activities.

In her place we welcome Hayley Newton as our new Fundraising Manager, who no doubt will also have some new ideas of her own, up her sleeve.

While 2013 was busy from a celebration point of view, 2014 promises to be just as busy but in a different way. We have major projects on the go at four of our properties, which will require both finances and resources to complete.

The final plans for our education building at Mayfields have been submitted and subject to approval by the planners, work should commence to erect the wooden building and toilets in May. This will provide a much needed facility for school visits etc as currently there is only a portaloo and very limited hand washing facilities. We are grateful for the donation that has allowed us to take this important project forward.

By the time you read this article work should have commenced on restoring the listed barn at Turnastone. The lengthy delay in starting

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this project has been caused by the planners at Hereford Council, but they have finally given us the go ahead. The farm yard has recently been concreted and it was good to report back from a recent visit, how much tidier the farm is now looking, since our new tenants Gareth and Madeleine Boaz took over the farm.

Work on the restoration of one of the old dairy buildings at Pierrepont is complete and part of it has been let to a young couple who are opening a micro brewery. We are hoping that once it is up and running it will generate interest from other small businesses in the area, so that the rest of the building can be let. This is the very first piece of the jigsaw in our long term plan to get all the buildings back into use and provide an income for the Trust.

We also have work to do on the property at our newest acquisition, Twyford Farm in Horsted Keynes, West Sussex. Both the house and the cottage are in need of renovation and we hope to commence work on the house in April. Our recent advertisement for the tenancy has created a lot of interest and the Trustees hope to make an appointment by the end of March.

In the coming months Kenny and I will be investing a lot of time and energy into trying to increase the number of volunteers at each of the properties. Volunteers are vital to the Trust and without them we simply couldn’t function in the way that we do. Over the years numbers have dwindled as people have got older or moved away, so we need to attract some new blood! At Lark Rise we are holding a Volunteer Taster Day on Saturday 5 April when members of the public will be invited to come along and give it a try. They will have an opportunity to try their hand at a variety of conservation tasks, along with monitoring etc. If this is successful we will hold similar days at our other properties. If you would like to become a volunteer at any of our properties please contact Kenny in the office. There is no previous experience required and tools are provided.

Another area we will be focusing on is Education. We now have Education Officers at Awnells, Lark Rise, Mayfields and Pierrepont.

We are also currently looking at ways of funding an education post at Margaret Wood. So many of today’s children are growing up with little or no knowledge of the countryside, or indeed where their food comes from. It’s therefore vital that the Trust plays its part in teaching the next generation about the countryside. We are working closely with schools located near our properties and whenever possible arranging school visits to the farms.

Finally I to want say a big thank you to all of you that donated to our 20th Anniversary Appeal. You gave the magnificent sum of £43,293. THANK YOU !!!

We have many challenges ahead in 2014 and much to achieve, but together we can do it.

Trust News

Introducing our new Trustees Our board of Trustees is made up of tireless volunteers who manage the Trust. Below we would like to introduce you to our three latest recruits.

Annabelle Evans

Annabelle has been involved with the Trust since early 2005. She is a solicitor specialising in agricultural property law and was responsible for looking after much of the Trust’s property work for almost 8 years. She therefore has a detailed knowledge of the Trust’s property portfolio and as a Trustee is able to provide valuable input on property issues.

She was fully involved in the Trust’s acquisition of Pierrepont Farm and Green Farm together with other smaller matters including the sale of the Turnastone Court Farmhouse.

In September 2012 she decided that life was too short and took a career break to put her family’s needs first. She lives in Ely and has three young children (a daughter of 9 years and 5 year old twins). She is married to Stewart, a civil engineer who specialises in the provision and treatment of water. A farmer’s daughter, Annabelle grew up on the family farm in Broadstairs, Kent usually helping out with planting and cutting cauliflowers. Her late father was an expert in the field of growing cauliflowers and developing new strains of cauliflower in his seed breeding business which is a specialism that her brother continues with to date.

Nicholas Watts

Nicholas has always been interested in wildlife and always lived on a farm. He started farming on his own account in 1966 with 400 acres and now farms 2,500 acres in the Fens between Spalding, Market Deeping and Bourne.

In 1982 he wanted to know what birds were breeding on his farm so he did his own breeding bird survey which he has done every year since. Recording the breeding birds on his farm has altered his life. After realising that birds were declining on his farm he decided to try and arrest this decline. Feeding birds and improving their habitat has become his major hobby and in doing this he has won more conservation awards than any other farmer in the UK, including being awarded the MBE and being made a fellow of the Royal Agricultural Society of England. His hobby also spawned a business of growing and selling wild bird food under the banner Vine House Farm. He is the largest grower of bird seed in the country and he sells it all over the UK.

Robin Maynard

Robin has worked for nearly 30 years in and around the environment movement.

After a short spell as a tree-surgeon and even shorter spell as an ‘ad man’, he went into volunteering at Friends of the Earth, just a few months before Chernobyl blew-up. That dark cloud led to a part-time job tracking radioactive fall-out across the UK and helping farmers get compensation from a reluctant MAFF, which was seeking to play down the impact on farmland. Since then he’s held various posts at FOE, Soil Association, FARM – plus a short stint on BBC R4’s Farming Today, where he met the chairman - the only person to walk over and welcome him at the late (and not so great, sadly) Royal Show!

Latterly, he worked for the Forestry Commission, resigning when the Government proposed to flog off England’s public woods and setting-up Our Forests with Jonathon Porritt to challenge and ultimately over-turn that ill-thought through plan. Currently, Robin works for the Avon Wildlife Trust. His dream is to run a ‘Care Farm’ – creating a place of purpose for people with all sorts of needs (including his own!).

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Financial Review

Income 2012/13

Expenditure 2012/13 Investment management costs 5%

Charitable activities 9% Friends 13%

Education 7% Legacies 29%

Donations 16% Other 16%

Investment income 17%

Total - £ 631,002

Farm and land management 34%

Governance 12% Conservation 13%

Costs of generating voluntary income 28%

Total - £ 437,354

Income An important source of income continues to be the Friends subscription scheme through which we received £84k in 2013, (2012 £80k).

We value highly the current support of our Friends in spite of challenging times – not only through membership, but also from donations, buying of merchandise, and of course from legacies.

This year, we have been fortunate to benefit from legacies totalling £186k (2012 £387k). These wonderful gifts are vitally important, making a real difference to the work that we can do and we are extremely grateful to all those who contribute in this way.

The level of donations generated through postal appeals for conservation projects continues to be successful. This year funds raised have enabled us to continue and expand our education programme, to employ a Monitoring Assistant in Herefordshire and to continue our core conservation and monitoring programme aimed at increasing farmland bird numbers. We were again overwhelmed by the strength of support from our members.

Our investment income has increased this year to £104k (2012 £78k), which is a result both of our increasing portfolio of rental properties and our first full year of income from our endowment.

This has helped to provide more stability to our overall income levels.

Our income from charitable activities (2013 £59k, 2012 £161k) comprises farm rents and monies from the Countryside Stewardship Scheme. 2012 was an unusual year with income boosted by the exceptional income generated from the harvesting of some mature timber at Green Farm.

Other incoming resources in 2013 of £93k, (2012 £15k) includes the £69k profit on the sale of the farmhouse at Turnastone. This will be used to help renovate some of the other old buildings at the farm.

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Expenditure We spent £236k this year (2012 - £271k) on our education, conservation and monitoring programmes, and managing and advising our increasing portfolio of farms and land. This year this heading has included costs for the hedgelaying at Turnastone, our squirrel breeding programme, the planting of new young trees at Green Farm and the continuing project on the Bourn Brook. Much of our work on wildlife monitoring and conservation however, is carried out by teams of volunteers at each farm.

Our costs of generating voluntary income £123k (2012 - £119k) which includes all our costs associated with fundraising, marketing, friends and database support, postal appeals and the Lark newsletter, has been maintained at 2012 levels.

Outcome for the year The year ended with a surplus of £283k (2012 - £424k) for the year. With economic difficulties affecting so many people, we were grateful that the majority of our income streams held up well, so that our education, conservation and monitoring programmes could continue to be maintained. The result leaves the Trust well placed to commence work on our future plans and projects.

Fundraising News

Thank You all so much!

The response to the 20th Anniversary Appeal was absolutely overwhelming. We had set ourselves the target of raising £20,000 but you have all exceeded our wildest expectations and the total is now: £43,293! As this is over double what we had hoped your generosity once again shows how much support is out there for our work. We can guarantee this money will all be spent furthering our vision of a wildlifefriendly and commercially-viable farming countryside.

Education Appeal Update Thank you to everyone who has donated to our Education Appeal, which in the CRT office has been nicknamed ‘the Kenny Appeal’. As the money is still coming in the total has not yet been added up and we will update you during the next Lark with the final figure. We are delighted to confirm Kenny is now working for the CRT full time, although, we don’t know which is more difficult, controlling his ideas or his hair!

On a more serious note, the full figure hoped for has not yet been raised, if you have yet to send in a donation please do consider it. Children are our future. Today they may aspire to be a fireman, ballerina or rock star, but one day they could be a farmer, a conservationist, or a politician, responsible for making decisions which have the potential to affect the future of their world.

Children can learn about nature, farming and how they can support one another when they are young by experiencing the great outdoors.

We are concerned that many are missing out but can introduce them to the countryside through school visits and special events.

Kenny wants to be able to carry out more school visits, and work with schools and our other Education Officers (in Surrey, Norfolk and Herefordshire) to develop a whole school Outdoor Curriculum – something which schools have been asking for. He wants to start a Saturday Club for families like the one in Herefordshire, and develop more family-friendly events.

Legacies Have you considered leaving a Living Legacy to the Countryside Restoration Trust? Legacies have made a huge difference to the work of the CRT, helping us to acquire and manage land, promote wildlife-friendly, environmentally sensitive food production, develop conservation initiatives and ensure our rural heritage is kept vibrant for future generations. No matter how large or small, leaving a legacy is a great way to leave your mark and such gifts make a real difference to what we are able to achieve. The CRT has a free information pack explaining everything you ever needed to know about legacies and writing a Will.

If you would like a copy please contact Hayley on 01223 262999

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Education

Creating, Collecting and Clubbing -It’s all here at Awnells !

Autumn is always a busy season here at Awnells. Our apple picking trips are extremely popular and this year was no exception.

We welcomed first-time visitors to Awnells from schools in Herefordshire and Gloucestershire, including two teachers who used to be in my classroom another lifetime ago when they were nine years old! It was fabulous to see them and have the privilege of working with their classes.

The apple harvest this time has been plentiful, so there was no shortage of fruit to pick this year. We even introduced the topic of ‘Micro-organisms’ for two Year 6 visits, looking at both the ‘good bacteria’ used in the process of cider-making and fermentation and the ‘bad bacteria’ with of course the necessity of washing hands after working in the orchard and why this is necessary.

We also welcomed ‘Orchard Art’ to work alongside us during the Big Apple Festival.

Led by David Marshall, Orchard Art is part

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of the Bulmer Foundation where groups of people with learning disabilities are given the opportunities to spend quality time in the countryside and work with different artists.

They came along to our orchard during the Big Apple Weekend and helped us to create a huge ‘Apple’ made from ………APPLES! It was a wonderful community event and attracted lots of visitors to help us during the day to complete our artwork. From the three year olds right up to the eighty -three year olds, all ages were involved and of course, learnt more about the Trust and it’s message about wildlife-friendly farming as they collected and created in our organic orchard.

Saturday Club has been fun over the last few months, concentrating of course on apple picking and towards the end of the year, cleaning and tidying up in the gardens and the orchard. Some of our young

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volunteers even created their own game of ‘catch the apple in the sack’, just proving how fresh air and open spaces encourage team work and creative thinking. Just recently, we also enjoyed a club session focussing on the importance of looking after our birds during the Winter months. Children made their own ‘bird cake’ and decorated nest boxes as they learnt about the life cycle of our birds and why they are so important to our countryside and gardens.

Finally two Christmas events included a craft and information stall at Westons Cider Xmas Bazaar and a family Open Day at Awnells to help spread our message.

If you have a group or class who would like to visit Awnells, then please contact Kenny on 01223 262999 for more information.

Dawn Harwood

Education

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New Education Officer at Pierrepont The transformation is underway! Since first arriving at Pierrepont in October, my first task has been to start making the farm’s classroom look like…well….a classroom!

After a lot of printing, cutting out and laminating, a couple of the displays are now really starting to take shape. And, with huge magnolia walls I couldn’t resist painting a mural, an ongoing project that will keep me busy for quite a while yet. As for furniture, this week saw the arrival of 35 green chairs, which is a good start.

Hopefully the tables won’t be far behind them.

I have also started collecting natural ‘artefacts’ that can be used as educational tools. So far I have an old bird’s nest, a wasp’s nest and a snake skin, but I’m continually on the lookout for anything interesting (and have roped all my friends and family into it as well).

The plan now is to create some sessions that will encourage teachers to use a trip to the farm to cover aspects of the national curriculum. I am already liaising with a local school that is looking to bring 3 year groups to the farm in June.

Annika Rees

An Outdoor Curriculum I am currently working with Hatton Park Primary School as part of a newly established steering group to develop an ‘Outdoor Curriculum’. As part of the outdoor curriculum we are going to set up “Hatton’s Horticultural Project”. The aim is for children to learn about vegetables, nutrition and personal health throughout the year.

We hope that the children will plant vegetables in March/April time.

After planting the children will learn how to care for these vegetables throughout the summer months (with a little help from the school caretaker) and finally harvest them to give to the church during October’s Harvest Festival.

Running alongside the “Hatton’s Horticultural Project”, we are planning to educate the children about wildlife with projects such as building an insect hotel and putting up bird boxes. This will allow the children to do mini beast hunts in the school grounds and learn about some of the threats to our garden birds, as well as hopefully encouraging the birds and insects to control pest species trying to eat our veggies!

Kenny MacKay

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Diary Dates LARK RISE FARM, Barton, Cambridgeshire Volunteer Taster Day – 5th April. (See below) Dawn Chorus – 25th April, 5.30 – 7.30am. Guided farm walk to hear the sunrise songsters followed by bacon butties!

Booking essential on 01223 262999. £5 per adult, £2 for children.

Volunteer Conservation Days - Usually held on the first Saturday of the month. Please call the office (01223 262999) for more information.

PIERREPONT FARM, Frensham, Surrey Pierrepont Open Day – 27th April, 11am – 5pm.

Volunteer Monitoring Group - Please call Bill Young (01243 811563) or email bill@parmelia.me.uk for more info.

Volunteer Conservation days – Held every 2 weeks (22nd Mar, 5th Apr, 19th Apr, 3rd May etc). For more info contact Brian Lavers (01276 471870 or brian.lavers@btopenworld. com) or visit www.crtinsurrey.org.uk.

MARGARET WOOD, Upper Denby, West Yorkshire Bluebell Festival – 10th May. Volunteer Conservation Days – 22nd March, 26th April.

Please contact Phil Opie (07762 642812 or jpo.92@live.co.uk) for more information.

TURNASTONE COURT FARM, Vowchurch, Herefordshire Open Day – 22nd June.

Volunteer Conservation Days - Please contact CRT Office 01223 262999 for more information.

AWNELLS FARM, Much Marcle, Herefordshire Easter Family Fun Day – 13th April, 11am - 2pm.

Awnell’s Saturday Club (7 – 12 year olds) - 15th March and 19th Apr, 2 – 4pm.

For more info please contact CRT Office 01223 262999.

Volunteer Conservation Days - Please call Donald Davies (01989 565097) for more information.

MAYFIELDS, Themelthorpe, Norfolk Festival of Farming, Food & Wildlife – 26th April, 11am – 3pm. Sheepdog demos, sheep races, guided farm walks, local produce stalls and so much more!

Please call Sarah Jenkins on 01362 683337 for more information or visit www.mayfieldsfarm.co.uk All these dates and further information can also be seen on our website www.CountrysideRestorationTrust.com

Volunteers As always our “Rustic” volunteers at Lark Rise have been busy over the last few months, they have been among other tasks hedge laying, osier cutting, clearing the pond and putting up bird boxes. We also hope that this year will provide some exciting conservation and monitoring projects for our volunteers to get their teeth stuck into.

We are planning to have a Volunteer Taster Day on the 5th of April to which all are welcome. At the taster day there will be various activities for people to try including making bird/bat boxes, small insect/bug hotels and conservation activities. More details can be found on the website or by calling the CRT office. After hosting a successful Volunteer Taster Day at Lark Rise we intend to roll out the format to our other properties in the hope that we will be able to attract more volunteers to all of our farms and woodland.

Plans are being put in place to come up with a schedule of conservation and

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monitoring projects at all our properties as a result of volunteer feedback. Most volunteers that I have spoken to like to know in advance what is being planned for conservation workdays, allowing them to make space in their diaries to attend. I also hope to run projects and activities that will give young people some work experience which will hopefully help them to gain paid employment.

I recently visited Margaret Wood in South Yorkshire, the weather was rain free but there was a very cold wind. There was an excellent turnout of volunteers who were having a go at some dry stone walling. I met several interesting people there including Edward, John and Phil. Sorry I haven’t mentioned you all by name but it was a pleasure to meet you all and I hope to be back for another visit soon to help organise the Bluebell Festival there on the 10th May. Edward took me on a tour of the property which himself and the volunteers have lovingly cared for over the years. There

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is still a lot of work to do there including repairing some of the dry stone walls and removing/replanting some of the ground covering brambles. I hope that by doing this we can encourage some new areas of bluebells and there is the potential of using the brambles with some willow/osier coppice to make an edible archway at the entrance to the pond area.

I hope in the next Lark to report on some of our volunteer work at our other properties, especially the tireless volunteers at Pierrepont Farm and Green Farm in Surrey, as well as at Awnells in Herefordshire. If you are interested in volunteering at any of our properties, then please have a look at our Diary Dates above for forthcoming volunteer days or contact the CRT office. We would be delighted to have you join us on what is sure to be an enjoyable and rewarding experience.

Kenny MacKay

Farm News Mayfields Farm, Norfolk Around the end of January each year my mind becomes more and more preoccupied with the coming lambing season. The breeding ewes at Mayfields have been out-wintered on a nearby farm. They have been grazing grass which will be made into hay during the summer months. Grazing benefits the grass crop, encouraging strong new regrowth when the ewes are removed, and it benefits the ewes by providing good quality forage during the early months of pregnancy. It also gives the ground at Mayfields a much needed slight break from the pressure of year round grazing. From now on, management of the ewes is critical. We hope to scan in February which will tell us how many lambs each ewe is carrying. From there we can determine her nutritional requirements for the later stages of pregnancy and ensure that she is fed correctly in order to carry and rear her lamb crop.

Also pregnant is Megan’s working sheepdog bitch Nevie. She is in pup to an International Supreme Brace Champion sheepdog. Neve herself is a very successful work and trials bitch, so it is with great excitement that we look forward to the birth of her pups.

Sarah Jenkins

Lark Rise Farm, Cambs An emotive subject in the countryside always is what time of the year should you cut your hedges. The rules and regulations say hedge cutting should be done between the beginning of September and the end of February. Under stewardship, hedges also should only be cut twice in every five years. This is all well and good, but hedges with maple and ash in become massively big and then when they are cut it literally looks like the Texas chainsaw massacre. I never get round to doing it myself, but I would favour sympathetic annual cutting.

Annual cutting allows much greater flexibility because you’re only

Margaret Wood, Yorkshire The wood is looking bare and dormant and just waiting for the first signs of Spring weather to start another year of growth and habitat for the birdlife. One thing which has started are the bluebells which are just showing the first little green shoots and promise another period of blue carpet when May comes.

The highlight of the winter season was once again, the visit of the reindeer (many thanks to CRT Trustee Tilly Smith for organising this) when the village children and indeed adults were delighted to see these wonderful creatures. This year we made things easier for our helpers as

Pierrepont Farm, Surrey Will it ever stop raining? With many Somerset farms under water we have little to complain about. Christmas Eve saw the River Wey at Pierrepont burst its banks and cross the meadow up to the garden wall but caused little damage, although the high winds brought down several trees. The constant rain has meant it has been challenging to keep the slurry pit from overflowing with few days available for spreading without causing damage to the fields.

The winter calving group has produced 10 lovely Jersey heifer calves which have remained very healthy despite the inclement weather, helped by improvements we have made to their diet.

cutting off small spindly one year growth and most berries remain on the second year growth that’s left in the main body of the hedge.

In winters where there is plenty of frost you can travel with your hedge cutter and not make a mess because the soil is frozen hard. In this very wet year I have just managed to cut a few roadside hedges and have steered clear of all infield hedges so they will have to have another year’s hedge cutting holiday.

On a general note most fields are totally saturated and a few are flooded but compared to the farmers down in the south west it’s mere bagatelle and they have my total heartfelt sympathy.

Tim Scott

the local church took care of the refreshments and we both made some income from the event – a good community link up.

On the planning agenda for the coming year are more planting in the woods to replace trees which haven’t survived and create other areas of young trees and also linking with the local school and planting a small orchard next to the barn.

As always we invite anyone who is interested to come along to one of our workdays, or by prior arrangement, to see the land and learn more of what we are doing. Next workdays are 22nd of March and 26th April and Bluebell Festival on 10th May. John Dunn

We also saw the first progeny from our Aberdeen Angus bull, Quartermaster some of which will be kept to graze the water meadows and the RSPB reserve next door.

A crop of fodder beet which we grew for the first time this year yielded reasonably well despite the drought conditions in the summer. Similar to sugar beet, it has provided extra energy which has helped boost milk production over the winter. This, coupled with 6 milk price increases over the summer and winter, has finally given us the confidence to replace the ageing feed wagon which had also become too small for the cows hungry appetites.

Mike and Bev Clear

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Merchandise

C. Notelets 2 different packs each containing 10 cards with envelopes (2 of each design). £6.00 (incl P&P)

A. Sweatshirt Available in burgundy, emerald green, dark blue or bottle green featuring the CRT emblem in yellow. Sizes available are small, medium, large and XL. £20.00 (incl P&P)

D. Skylark Lapel Badge Iconic CRT skylark lapel badge in gilt.

Comes with its own presentation box. £15.00 (incl P&P)

E. Beanie Hat In navy blue or bottle green with CRT logo embroidered in colour. £6.50 (incl P&P)

G. Christmas Cards - SALE Sale of residual stock. Non-specific designs. 10 cards per pack with envelopes. £3.00 (incl P&P)

B. Fleece Wonderfully warm fleece with full front zip.

Available in dark blue or bottle green featuring CRT logo embroidered in full colour. Sizes available are medium, large and XL. £20.00 (incl P&P)

F. Bodywarmer - SALE H. 2015 Calendar – SALE Slimline wall calendar with 12 stunning images to brighten your wall and plenty of space for notes.

Was £6.50 NOW £5.00 (incl P&P)

Merchandise Order Form Name:___________________________________________________ Address:_________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________ Postcode:_________________________ Telephone:______________ Email:____________________________________________________ I enclose a cheque for £_____________________________________ (Please make payable to The Countryside Restoration Trust) You can also pay over the phone by credit card (01223 262999).

Or order on the website www.countrysiderestorationtrust.com Please return to: The Countryside Restoration Trust, Bird’s Farm, Haslingfield Rd, Barton, Cambridge CB23 7AG

Dark blue, fleece lined with CRT logo embroidered in full colour. Sizes available are medium, large, XL and XXL. Previous price £35. NOW £28.00 (incl P&P)

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