MILLER PLACE FARM

LORTON

THE FARM

ENVIRONMENTAL FEATURES

VISITORS

MILLER PLACE FARM is run by Pauline Blair and two sons who help when they can. For some years casual labour has been employed too.

HISTORY

The existing farm is the original Millbeck Farm which is part-owned and part-rented, plus additional enclosed fell and fell rights for 987 ewes onto Buttermere and Brackenthwaite Common.

The original Millbeck farm buildings date from the early 1800’s; the farm as a whole was sold in the early 1990’s for residential purposes. In 1993 Pauline Blair bought part of Millbeck Farm land and she linked this to her existing fell rights and a 28.5 hectare enclosed fell on the opposite side of the valley. Since 2001, she has rented the remainder of the land to make it into an entity.

Pauline Blair sees the circumstances and pressures of her farm as an ‘early warning’ of what could happen in the Lake District as a whole. A profile of Brackenthwaite and Buttermere commons shows that the number of active shepherds has halved in the last ten years. This, coupled with uneven distribution regarding age; area covered; shortage of housing and lack of successors, puts some areas of the common in danger of becoming unviable.

LOCATION

TERRAIN

High fell, scree and crag, rising to 500 metres.

SIZE OF THE FARM

Mosser: (enclosed fell) is 26 hectares

Inbye: (SDA): 25.86 hectares

On the common, the rights amounts to 300 hectares+, but Pauline is responsible for shepherding over 600 ha.

LIVESTOCK & NUMBERS

Pauline Blair has always run a traditional fell flock of Herdwicks and Swales. She started in 1981 with 76 sheep which were the remnants of two fell flocks being sold.

Over the next 10 years she learnt the art of traditional shepherding from a retired well respected shepherd, Jack Bland.

By 1994 the flock had grown to over 1300 sheep (600/700 ewes; 300-350 shearlings; 350 hoggs.)

In 1998 an ESA agreement for the common reduced the flock from 1500 to 650.

Pauline is one of a few farmers who have re-heafed a flock; this has involved a lot of shepherding. Since 1999 she has maintained only hardy fell sheep, shepherded according to traditional practice, although prior to that she tried keeping the older ewes on rented lowland to breed a higher value lamb.

In the higher level entry scheme, the maximum number that can be run (on the common) is 360 in August; this has to be taken down to 180 from December to May.

Heafing patterns are breaking down with these low numbers.

GRAZING & CONSERVATION

The aim is to show a way forward for genuinely sustainable hill farming, using common ground, but without the use of artificial fertilizer or extra feed. As Pauline sees it, this is the most cost effective, environmentally friendly method. It creates and maintains a highly valued and bio-diverse cultural landscape.

To further improve their genetic hardiness, the sheep, including the shearlings, spend most of their lives on the fell, without any supplementary feed, even in winter.

Given the high cost of rearing a hill sheep, the low value of pure bred hardy fell lambs and the fluctuating (often disasterously low) prices for draft ewes, Pauline’s objective is to break even economically.