YSG 2 Day Site Visit December 2023

A very busy couple of days – setting up for two Tamworth pigs to move on to one of our 1 acre test areas, learning about and assessing what trees we have in the 1 acre plots, visiting Tebay Common to explore their leaky dams and see how we might use these at WGP, and a Christmas Quiz! Of course the weather was wet and cold ……..

We started with a tree ID session. We don’t have many trees so it’s important that we know what is on the land and learning to ID them in winter using fallen leaves and bark is a useful skill. Knowing what we already have gives us an idea of what might appear from seed once the ground has been broken up by the pigs and cows. It also helps us assess what’s missing and plan how to remedy this.

Following our tree ID session we worked in two groups – one group making the fence pig proof, while the other group carried the very heavy pig ark up the hill and set it up – lucky pigs!!

Our two Galloways arrived on the lower 1 acre plot – to start their conservation grazing.

We spent the evening in a nice warm B&B in Tebay, thawing out with sausages and chips and the Christmas quiz 🙂

On Sunday we visited Tebay Common to see how they’re using leaky dams to slow water flow and then came back to WGP to have a closer look and measure the water flow in the grips on our bog. Despite looking like they are naturally filling in with vegetation there’s still a lot of water running through them and off the bog. The big project for 2024 will be a feasibility study assessing the best way to fill them in.

It was so amazing when the sun came out for a few minutes everyone had to lie down and look at it ……

Great to be starting our conservation grazing journey with pigs and cows arriving in our 1 acre plots …….