Merits of an untidy landscape

This afternoon Danielle and I took a walk to explore the scarp slope of the chalk downs several miles west of where we live. An area of ancient chalk grassland, mostly too steep to plough, has been set aside for nature.

The landowners are being paid by the state to preserve this fragment of historic countryside, which is rich in plant life and, therefore, in insects and butterflies too.

It is "untidy" compared to the manicured grain fields with their neat tram lines where the tractors drive. (I am impressed by how accurately the drivers operate, leaving geometric patterns second only in effect to the great British crop circles.)

Of course "untidy" is just a spin word for "unproductive". But now our land is so "productive" that farmers are being paid to turn land into nature reserves - thankfully, before it was all ploughed over.

The grass is rich and varied. This land has never been ploughed or sprayed with chemicals. It reminds me of the meadows far away in the Carpathian mountains. This is the kind of grass that made the hay for my horses. Mixed grass, natural and balanced, with none of the dairy grasses that are too rich in sugar for many horses.

How I wish that I could find hay made from this kind of grass. It was so easy before. Now this kind of hay is a luxury, if it can even be bought.

Danielle loves to photograph wild flowers, so she was in her element. Whilst she photographed, I lay in the grass and looked up at the changing sky. The breeze formed clouds, broke and reformed them. Here is the view through the waving grass, soft and cool on my limbs as I lay there like a pastoral character of old.

I'm sure that country people worked hard in the old days. However that image of a white-clad shepherd lounging in the grass does persist. Probably it has persisted since ancient Greek myth, when centaurs and satyrs circulated.

The rabbits keep busy on this slope, where the tall grass offers protection against birds of prey. Down below, rabbits graze and multiply. Above, Red Kites and other birds wheel and soar. In the middle, insects buzz and whirr. It is a great big complex ecosystem.

As you can see, rabbits have a difficult time burrowing in the chalk. There are lots of little white rocky fragments in the dirt.

Hares are prolific too, by their standards. However they are solitary and don't burrow.

Here is a broad panorama of the great amphitheatre of Childrey Warren, part nature reserve, part farmland.

In the foreground, you can see more of the "untidyness" which not really a lack of tidyness at all (except to a bureaucrat, or to a farmer paid by a bureaucrat). It's a rolling, grassy, complex place with meadow and hedgerow and bush, where there is a micro-view as well as a macro-view across the landscape. This is the kind of thing that I enjoyed in Eastern Europe, just as bureaucrats and capitalists joined forces to destroy it there too.

Fortunately a few fragments remain here in Oxfordshire. Once all the hills were like this. It was within living memory.

Comments

[funder]

There's the Watership Down hole! Cool :)

I don't usually comment, but I enjoy the "scenery of England" posts quite a bit.

[I Gallop On]

Ah. I love an untidy landscape.

Simply beautiful. Thanks for sharing that.

Kimberly

[Callie]

I love rolling hills farmed as well as left to nature!