By Chris Bailey, Advisory Manager, Scotland
This years RSPB Telegraph Nature of Farming Award competition was tight with several high quality applications vying for the top spot. The overall Scottish winners were David and Morag Miller of Geise Farm in Caithness, with John Leith awarded a highly commended for his work at Backhill Farm, Aberdeenshire.
A winning partnership
David and Morag Miller run a 49ha beef and sheep farm near Thurso managing 45 cattle and 200 sheep per year. Their business is run with both environmental and economic considerations given equal emphasis. Alongside careful grazing, the Millers entered an agri-environment agreement in 1999, to help create and restore the key habitats on their farm. These habitats include areas of SSSI species-rich grassland, wetlands, moorland and broad-leaved woodland.
The Millers have formed a strong relationship with Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) and their local conservation rangers, and worked together to set conservation objectives tailored to make the best of their land. Species recorded include lapwing, yellowhammer, tree sparrow, dipper, barn owl and otter to name but a few. In addition plants, butterflies and moths monitoring has taken place.
They plan to continue to add to their 2,200m of established paths, planting more trees and sowing more native countryside wild flowers around the paths to encourage butterflies further. They allow public access to these paths because they want everyone interested in the environment to experience and enjoy this special place. Working with the Local Access Forum and SNH they have promoted their work to the community, especially schools and colleges by producing information leaflets and interpretation boards.
I found the Millers commitment to making the farm more accessible to the public very impressive, and it is a great tribute to them that most of the environmental management has been self-funded. We were very pleased to make them this year’s Scottish winner of the Nature of Farming Award.
Highly commended
John Leith produces high-quality malting barley on his 79 ha arable unit. Due to his interest in wildlife and the environment and through use of land managers options within agri-environment, he has integrated a number of measures to enhance the wildlife on his farm.
These measures include 6 m grass margins around the barley fields. These herb-rich areas have provided a nesting habitat for grey partridge. In addition, he has sown three hectares of wild bird seed mix which provides seed throughout the winter for yellowhammer, tree sparrow and grey partridge. John has also helped lapwing by avoiding nests whilst sowing the spring crops and leaving the wet unproductive areas uncropped.
These farmers work hard to help wildlife on their farms every day, and to share this with their communities. Show them that wildlife-friendly farming matters to you by voting for the overall UK winner of this year’s Nature of Farming Award – only 2 days to go! Voting opens on Friday 20th July at www.rspb.org.uk/farmvote
The EU LIFE+ Programme funds RSPB work which supports wildlife-friendly farming that furthers sustainable development in the European Union.
Hi Heather,with all these farmers taking great care of farming wildlife friendly surely things will improve.Really like those who encourage visits to farm especially schools and tend to vote for those.