Smithills Estate Demonstration Event
Smithills Woodland Trust Estate. Burnt Edge to right, Sugar Loaf to left. Barrow Bridge Chimney just visible through the mist.
Earlier this week, I was invited to a demonstration event at the new Woodland Trust Estate here in Smithills. This estate starts just across the road, I can see the trees from my office window. This event was to explain to local and similar conservation organisations what the plans are and to gather ideas on the future vision of the estate.
As part of this demonstration we took a minibus ride onto the estate. A wet morning, the cloud was down to the road, we couldn’t see anything from the bus apart from the closest hedges and overgrazed fields. Muddy fields around the farms on Coal Pit Lane were in a terrible state, not just from the foul weather from the past few weeks, but from overgrazing and poor farming.
As we got off the bus at Holden’s Farm the clouds lifted a little, revealing the main farmed area of the estate down to Barrow Bridge chimney on the far edge of the estate. Muddy fields surrounded us as we walked along, stopping in places to see the improvements done by the trust. Much improved drainage channels has cleared blockages and dried out the pathway.
We walked around to Burnt Edge, stopping occasionally to discuss the history of the area and improvements planned for the future. Apparently the Edge is a rare habitat area full of Harvestmen (Daddy Longlegs to me).
A fun and interesting day, where we came up with lots of great ideas, hope it all works out.
Antondotreks 