I live not far from the north Pennine area of natural beauty. It’s what passes for wilderness in Britain, although in reality that means 3-5000 years of human activity and management on the land. It’s a beautiful area, especially at this time of year when the heather is in its full purple period. The soils are very thin and rocky, the landscape windswept and what grows tends to come up know more than knee height.
Heather moors take a special type of management, and they tend to be managed with sheep and grouse in mind. Indeed, the upland heather moor is a habitat fairly unique to the British isles. Of course, there is pressure from the government on gamekeepers and those managing the moors to abandon the time tested techniques they’ve used and embrace the urban, prettified way politicians believe the countryside can be run - as a theme park. Fortunately, heather burning is still allowed although restricted and has not suffered the same fate as stubble burning which was banned in 1993.
Image via: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Swaledale_sheep#/media/File:Swaledale_sheep_above_Kingsdale_(geograph_3338574).jpg
The sheep on the Pennine uplands are generally hefted. An old English word whose root meaning is “lifted”, this means that the sheep are put out onto the uplands and left to their own devices for long periods of time. They are regularly, but infrequently, moved down off the hills and traditionally there were meetings where the sheep that had strayed from their matriarchal home areas would be sorted back into the flock. There are not any particular predators for healthy adult sheep in this area, foxes are known to take lambs and the eagles which are capable of carrying off a lamb tend to live much further to the north. By far the biggest threat to ovine life in the Pennines appears to be the car.
The traditional management for grouse and sheep has served to maintain this unique landscape for generations. We often hear how “meat consumption must be reduced or stopped to protect the environment” which in the case of Britain’s marginal lands would be utter folly. Only hardy and independent animals can be raised on such landscapes and there’s no crop which can be grown there.
I shan’t dwell on driven shooting on the heather clad hills, something which has gained a good number of internet column inches. This is partly because the shots involved tend to have a degree of wealth and influence, and partly because the devolved Scottish government have never seen a natural activity they don’t want to ban, persecute or make impossible. However farcical British government may be, the Scottish national assembly always manages to outdo it by an order of magnitude.
Returning to the more pleasant Pennines we can examine their most famous cloven hooved residents. The sheep themselves are from a mix of breeds, although by far the most common are the Swaledale. Originally from Yorkshire, the breed is common throughout the north Pennines. Its distinctive black head, white fleece and tightly curled horns make it look exactly like a child’s idealised version of a sheep. Not as heavy as some of the meatier (and rather less aesthetically pleasing) breeds such as Texels. Their wool is known to be of good quality, though not as valuable as lowland breeds. Unfortunately due to the bizarre logic of a nationalised wool purchasing system and fast fashion outlets proudly proclaiming the merits of their recycled plastic clothing, a sheep’s fleece basically has no value. Swaledale wool is bought by the British Wool Marketing board at around 40 pence a kilo.
The meat of the sheep has an excellent reputation too, but it’s not something you’ll find easy to buy or try. Unlike Spain, France or Italy, this unique breed which is farmed in a traditional, low impact, manner in a unique landscape is not marketed, protected or promoted. What should be a jewel in the crown of northern farming needs a hefty push, especially in a world which values skinless chicken breasts and micro-plastic shedding nylon “fleece” clothing.
It’s sad that the wool which brought medieval England its wealth is now an afterthought, and that sheep farming - the very reason a landscape has been preserved - is seen as a political embarrassment and one that offends impractical notions of arbitrarily assigned environmental credits.
Herdwicks for us Back o Skiddaw people.