BRIEF OVERVIEW OF THE HISTORY OF HILL FARMING IN CUMBRIA

The fells and dales have been farmed by livestock farmers for thousands of years but the present-day farming landscape is largely the product of evolution since the Norse colonisation of Cumbria around AD 900.  Most Viking Age settlement was probably around the edges of the Lake District but the higher ground would have been used as summer grazings.  After the Norman Conquest, most of the fells were technically lord’s ‘forest’, a term indicating legal status as a hunting ground rather than woodland.  As such the fells and dales were under the direct control of large landowners.  Despite their status, hunting was less important than livestock rearing.  The lords allowed peasant colonists to settle in many of the dales: the sites of many hill farms have probably been occupied since the great wave of colonisation between c.1150 and c. 1300, when Norse words (such as ‘thwaite’ for a clearing) were still in use.  Temporary dwellings (Norse ‘scale’) on the summer pastures (Norse ‘saetr’, as in Satterthwaite) became permanent farms as small, irregular-shaped fields were carved from the wastes.

The large medieval landowners kept control of the heads of some valleys, establishing large cattle ranches (known as ‘vaccaries’) at places such as Gatesgarth, at the head of Buttermere, Gillerthwaite at the head of Ennerdale, and Wasdalehead.  Some fell pastures were granted to monasteries, who then established stock-rearing granges at places such as Grange in Borrowdale and Brotherilkeld at the head of Eskdale.

By the Tudor period these lordly farms had been leased and the dales were heavily populated by small farms, consisting of inbye land on the valley floor (part of which was often a small open field of arable land with shared meadow ground as well) and common rights on the open fells.  Between c. 1600 and 1800 the number of farms declined as holdings were amalgamated, the open fields were enclosed, and flocks and herds increased in size.  The 19th century saw the great wave of Parliamentary Enclosure, during which thousands of acres of fellside and moorland were enclosed and divided into large rectilinear fields by dry stone walls, though much common land survived.

With thanks to Angus Winchester, Lancaster University

A RECENT HISTORY OF HILL FARMING

The scheme which helped to define hill farming as a sector was the Hill Livestock Compensatory Allowance system which came into existence in 1976. Each European member state was allowed to develop a system which suited national circumstances with 25% of the funds coming from the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund.  The HLCA provided compensation for the additional costs of production in the hills. It also had social objectives of keeping people in the countryside and thereby supporting the social fabric.

SHEEP PRODUCTION

The HLCA scheme effectively provided incentives to adopt particular livestock systems which encouraged a stratified sheep industry through which the core of the national breeding and store stock was produced in the hills and its product was sold down the hill for crossbred reproduction or further feeding for the food chain. In relation to hill sheep there was a requirement for sheep to be of “hardy breeds” which were defined in a list.  Included amongst those most relevant to Cumbria were the Swaledale, Rough Fell, Herdwick, Cheviot and Blackface breeds. There was also a requirement that the flock be structured around “regular flock ages” with the youngest generation comprising 15% of the flock, normally obviating the need for flock replacements to be bought in , other than tups.

The National Sheep Association describes this stratification in the following terms:

“The base of the UK sheep industry starts in the SDA in the hills where native hardy breeds of sheep are pure bred. After three or four crops of lambs, the breeding ewes move down to the DA and mate to the Blue faced Leicester rams to produce the prolific crossbred mule ewes for lowland farms where they are mated with Suffolk/Texel and similar type rams for prime lamb production… This unique UK system of breeding ewes being produced in the upland areas, allows the lowlands to produce the maximum amount of prime lamb. The surplus male lambs produced in the uplands are mostly sold through local auction marts for lowland finishing or, if sufficient finish is achieved in the uplands, to slaughterers.”

This system effectively established the Cumbria hill farming model in the sheep sector, with the main thrust being the breeding of Swaledale sheep in hill flocks with the draft ewes being marketed for the production of the North of England Mule. The Mule became the supreme breeding sheep of the English lowlands. Producers of the minority hill breeds like the Rough Fell and the Herdwick were largely unable to follow this model, but some Rough Fell breeders persevered with a Masham type cross or else produced a cross bred store lamb from older ewes as did Herdwick breeders from their older sheep. These store lambs were bought by lowland farmers for fattening, but some hill farmers fattened some or all of these crossbred lambs and the same applied to the wether lambs of the main hill breed that they produced.

This system was widely supported by farmers not just for its income generation, but also on account of the sustainable flock management practices it encouraged them to adopt. But, because it was run on a headage basis, it tended to encourage farmers to increase stock numbers; itt encouraged what farmers themselves called “the numbers game” with the number of breeding ewes in the English LFAs increasing by about 35% between 1980 and 2000. HLCA payments were also supplemented by Sheep Annual Premium payments which began in 1990, and which also include a Less Favoured Area supplement. A considerable sum eventually rested on the head of each eligible animal which, before the introduction of the Single Farm Payment, was  based on quotas.  Between 1987 and 1999 sheep numbers increased markedly and there was a 21% reduction in the number of hill farms which kept cattle as well as sheep.

BEEF PRODUCTION

Although virtually all hill farms historically kept some cattle, the decline in this practice  had begun in the 1970s on many of the smaller hill farms. Suckler cow production became very specialised and involved housing and high quality forage production  through silage making which was normally concentrated on the better land resources of farms in hill areas. Nationally, about 40% of beef cows are in the LFA, with in recent years, the majority of suckler cows being provided from crosses out of the dairy herd. Those hill farms which continued their suckler cow enterprises needed to invest in buildings for winter housing and to adopt systems for silage making and subsequent handling.

Suckler cow producers also almost invariably used continental bulls (Limousin and Charollais most commonly) on Angus cross Friesian cows.  Native and traditional breeds virtually disappeared from the hills in this period, an exception in Cumbria (but outside the Fells and Dales) being the Border/Hadrian’s Wall area where there was a continuing local commitment to production of Galloway and Blue Grey cattle. More recently there has been some renewed interest in native breed cattle on a few hill farms where their meat is often specially marketed.

With thanks to Geoff Brown