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From Shetland to the Scilly Isles, Open Country travels the UK in search of the stories, the people and the wildlife that make our countryside such a vibrant place. Each week we visit a new area to hear how local people are growing the crops, protecting the environment, maintaining the traditions and cooking the food that makes their corner of rural Britain unique.
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Batsford Park Estate, Gloucestershire
Richard Uridge visits the Batsford Park Estate, Gloucestershire. The estate has managed to keep its traditional arrangement of forestry and tenant farmers, although now there are 300 acres of woodland and a more formal arboretum open to the public. Richard explores the differences and similarities in running the estate in the 20th and 21st centuries.
The Freeman family first owned the estate in the early part of the 17th century, and Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford (later 1st Lord Redesdale) inherited the estate in 1886. He demolished the Georgian house, built a new mansion and redesigned the gardens, erasing all traces of the original layout, creating a "wild" garden of near natural plantings inspired by his observations of plant groupings in the Japanese landscape. He was succeeded by his second son David, who was father of the famous Mitford sisters. The five older girls and their brother Tom all lived at Batsford during the first world war, and Nancy based the early part of her novel Love In A Cold Climate on her time there. Three generations of Lord Dulverton have since looked after the estate, and in 1984 Batsford Park was donated to a charitable trust founded by the 2nd Lord Dulverton to ensure the future of the Arboretum.
Batsford Park Arboretum
Richard meets John Jones, the recently retired head gamekeeper who still works voluntarily on the estate. He started out in life in a large family on a smallholding and they poached for food to survive. At 16 he was caught and prosecuted - but when a new gamekeeper was appointed, John was taken on and trained up - a real poacher turned gamekeeper.
On a windy hillside, Richard discovers Edward Clarkson, the Estate Manager. He's the present Lord Dulverton's stepson and gave up stockbroking to run the Estate - a far better life, he says. His brief has been to bring the Estate into the 21st century without spoiling its inherent charm. The latest plan is a hi-tech biomass scheme which will start next year. Woodchips, a by-product of forestry, will be burned in an innovative system which will create electricity and heating for the 38-bedroomed house. Surplus electricity will be sold to the National Grid and the experiment will thus lower costs and provide an income for the Estate in an "invisible" way.
Richard ventures into the forest to meet Eric Norledge and Mike Hartnell. Eighty-year-old Eric retired as Head Forester 15 years ago and this is his first visit back since then. He worked on the estate for 42 years under three Lord Dulvertons, and tells Richard how they did nothing but plant trees for nine years after the Second World War - and now they are all grown. When Eric retired, his protégée Mike Hartnell took over. The two of them discuss how things have changed, from hand-scything lawns to felling trees in minutes with chainsaws. For Eric, it was all to do with creating the woodland. But for Mike, making money is paramount to keep the estate going.
And at the end of his day on the Estate, Richard meets Tim Allen, who succeeded John Jones as Head Gamekeeper. He introduces Richard to the 21st century way of rearing pheasants - all gas heating and electric fences, a far cry from John's more low-key ways. But in the end, the principles of game-keeping haven't changed that much in the last 100 years or so - and everyone on the estate is aware that their work must be seen as part of a much bigger picture over many lifetimes as the estate continues through time.
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