The Limestone Country Project
The Limestone Country Project is a five year project based
in the limestone areas of the Yorkshire Dales. The Project
has a £1.27 million budget, of which £550K
is from the European Union LIFE (Nature) fund; money specifically
allocated by the EU to support the management of internationally
important wildlife sites. It is a partnership project,
jointly project managed by English Nature and the Yorkshire
Dales National Park Authority, with a number of other partners
including the National Trust, the Grazing Animals Project,
National Beef Association and the Rare Breeds Survival
Trust. The Project has now been running for just over two
years.
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| Blue
Grey Cattle on Ingleborough National Nature Reserve
(Yorkshire Dales) |
The limestone areas of the Yorkshire Dales are of national
and international importance for biodiversity. These areas
are associated with the distribution of Carboniferous limestone
and the majority of the area is concentrated in the uplands
around Ingleborough and Malham. The soils overlying this
rock are usually very thin and of low fertility and, in
combination with consistent grazing, result in a rich diversity
of lime-loving grasses and wildflowers for which the “limestone
country” of the Dales is famous. The limestone grasslands
are dominated by blue moor grass with colourful species
such as bloody crane’s-bill, rockrose, small scabious
and wild thyme.
This is also an important area for limestone pavements
with 50% of the UK’s pavements within the Yorkshire
Dales. Limestone Pavement is a unique and declining resource
of international conservation importance.
The Yorkshire Dales landscape and habitats have been influenced
to a large degree through a long history of pastoral farming.
However agricultural census returns over last 40 years
show a general decline in mixed farming – for a variety
of reasons, both economic and cultural. Research carried
out during the development of the Limestone Country Project
showed clearly that much of the higher limestone land was
now being grazed exclusively by sheep. Despite having had
a long history of summer cattle grazing the land is now
seen as not being of good enough forage quality, and cattle
grazing viewed as too labour intensive or uneconomic. Where
cattle are still present these tend to be the larger commercial
continental breeds and these are rarely left on the land
for any significant time period.
There is now a wide amount of experience regarding the
role that traditional cattle breeds may have in helping
maintain important wildlife sites and a large number of
wildlife sites are being managed by traditional breeds
to enhance their biodiversity. Native upland cattle breeds
have been recognised for their ability to graze unimproved
upland grasslands and convert low quality forage much more
effectively. They are also less selective graziers and
thus encourage greater diversity within grassland swards.
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| Ingleborough
National Nature Reserve |
The Limestone Country Project aims to restore habitats
within the Ingleborough Complex and Craven Limestone Complex
Special Areas for Conservation (SACs) by encouraging a
return to mixed farming using hardy upland cattle breed.
We are aiming to introduce native upland cattle onto a
minimum of 1,500 ha of limestone habitats in the project
area, working with 15-20 farming enterprises.
Farmers joining
the Project are able to select from a range of native cattle
breeds, including Galloway, Shorthorn, Blue Grey, Luing,
Highland and Welsh Black. Blue Greys would have been a
very common sight amongst suckler herds in the Dales only
40 years ago and we envisage that they will play a very
important role in the future of the Project. Several farmers
have already chosen Blue Greys with which to stock their
land.
Recently in the summer of 2003, as part of the Project,
English Nature purchased a herd of Blue Grey cattle. The
19 yearling heifers and 7 two-year old heifers have grazed
across 180 hectares of upland rough grazing from June right
through to January 2004 when they were removed and outwintered
on more lowland pastures in Cumbria.
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| Grazing
one of the Three Peaks in the Yorkshire Dales National
Park |
These Blue Grey cattle
were brought onto the Ingleborough National Nature Reserve
to tackle the blue moorgrass which was the dominant grass
on the higher land, in order to increase species diversity
amongst the grassland swards. Blue moorgrass is typically
avoided by sheep and continental cattle which preferentially
graze the fescue swards. Since May 2004 these cattle have
been back grazing on the slopes of Ingleborough and although
as yet we have no hard scientific evidence for wildlife
habitat improvements, the initial visible results are promising.
We are, however monitoring both the performance, economic
viability and grazing impact of the cattle, including using
radio collars which will locate the herd and allow us to
gain information on their grazing and behavioural patterns.
The results from this research will start to become available
from late 2005.
Local farmers seem very enthusiastic about the Project
and we currently have 12 agreements with farmers in addition
to the English Nature herd. There are a further ten farms
on the short list for entry over the next 1 - 2 years.
We
have also been working with local marketing consultants
to help create a market within which to sell their beef
direct to the consumer and are currently looking into viability
of any local project branding. We have also been fortunate
to grab the attention and support of the celebrity TV cook,
writer, and broadcaster Sophie Grigson, who has already
attended and cooked for an evening meal attended by all
participating farmers and other key individuals.
The first
Limestone Country Beef (Blue Grey) was on sale in ten kilogram
boxes via the internet in October 2004.
 If anyone is interested in any further information on the
Limestone Country Project - Paul
Evans (English Nature
- 01969 623447), Louise
Williams – (Limestone Country
Project - 01756 752748) or Tim
Thom (Yorkshire Dales National
Park Authority - 01756 752748).
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other Blue Grey links
the bluegrey
Looking after the environment at
Hotbank
Blue Greys at Ardjachie
Farney Shield Blue Greys
Upland Management
Bloch Blue Greys
Spoutbank Blue Greys
Glensaugh Research Station
The Contribution to Biodiversity made
by the Blue Grey Cow
Northumberland National Park Drovers
Project
Outwintering Cattle
Blue Grey Sales
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