CITY LIVING

It's been 50 years since the first city farm was established and their role in providing a haven for nature continues to grow

- MIKE COLLINS

I'M LOOKING DOWN at giants - a beech tree avenue that is at least 180 years old. The lime green leaves have created a spectacular show, and clusters of bluebells add a seasonal splash of colour. I can just make out the sound of faint tapping and out of the corner of my eye I see a great spotted woodpecker. As I make my way down the steep hillside, a speckled wood butterfly glides in front of me and I catch the excited sounds of a group of children pond-dipping for newts and toads.

Suddenly, the stillness of the spring morning is broken by a train making its way from Bristol to London. I'm wandering the one-mile trail at Bath City Farm and it's a real wildlife treat. One of 50 city farms across the UK, this 37-acre haven is a wonderful example of why these places matter for wildlife in urban landscapes.

City farms are celebrating their goth anniversary this year. Kentish Town was the first to open its doors, in October 1972. Only 5km as the crow flies from central London, it's squeezed between two railway lines and dense rows of housing in Camden.

The original idea of a city farm was a simple one: take a small piece of land and use food production and farming as a way to connect communities. Following the founding of Kentish Town, city farms started to pop up all over the UK. Green oases in landscapes of tarmac, concrete, and steel, city farms became places where children who might rarely visit the countryside could see a cow close-up, collect eggs from the hens and connect with nature.

All urban green spaces matter for wildlife, but city farms offer a bit extra in terms of the habitats they can squeeze into a space not much larger than a football pitch. They may be small (the UK's largest, Woodlands Farm in Greenwich, is 89 acres) yet they play a key role in reversing some of the species and habitat loss that we're seeing.