WHAT if everything we were told about farming, that it cannot exist without hurting the environment, without hurting Nature, was wrong? What if, instead of damaging Nature, farming could help it flourish and that, as well as restoring habitats, we could feed nine billion people? Jake Fiennes says you can and he’s proving it.
He has 30 years of experience managing landscapes, a passion he’s harboured since childhood. Bar two years doing PR for London nightclub Limelight, Mr Fiennes, who has two actor brothers, Ralph and Joe, has been walking and working the fields of the UK, listening, watching and understanding how the complex, unpredictable forces of Nature can co-exist with the managed environment.
His career began at Knepp Castle in West Sussex with Sir Charles Burrell and Isabella Tree, but it wasn’t until he became a gamekeeper, then estate manager, at Sir Nicholas Bacon’s Raveningham estate in Norfolk that his theories were put into practice. There, Mr Fiennes realised something wasn’t right. ‘The mid 1990s was the peak of intensification of agriculture. We had 10% set aside, land doing nothing,’ he remembers. ‘It wasn’t producing food and it wasn’t even useful for the natural world because it was considered “nothing”. We topped it, in April, May and June, when we had hares and skylarks and butterflies and caterpillars and their young. It was wrong. I could see hares being scorched by chemicals and they would be writhing in the fields being poisoned.’
Denne historien er fra April 28, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra April 28, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Kitchen garden cook - Apples
'Sweet and crisp, apples are the epitome of autumn flavour'
The original Mr Rochester
Three classic houses in North Yorkshire have come to the market; the owner of one inspired Charlotte Brontë to write Jane Eyre
Get it write
Desks, once akin to instruments of torture for scribes, have become cherished repositories of memories and secrets. Matthew Dennison charts their evolution
'Sloes hath ben my food'
A possible paint for the Picts and a definite culprit in tea fraud, the cheek-suckingly sour sloe's spiritual home is indisputably in gin, says John Wright
Souvenirs of greatness
FOR many years, some large boxes have been stored and forgotten in the dark recesses of the garage. Unpacked last week, the contents turned out to be pots: some, perhaps, nearing a century old—dense terracotta, of interesting provenance.
Plants for plants' sake
The garden at Hergest Croft, Herefordshire The home of Edward Banks The Banks family is synonymous with an extraordinary collection of trees and shrubs, many of which are presents from distinguished friends, garnered over two centuries. Be prepared to be amazed, says Charles Quest-Ritson
Capturing the castle
Seventy years after Christian Dior’s last fashion show in Scotland, the brand returned under creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri for a celebratory event honouring local craftsmanship, the beauty of the land and the Auld Alliance, explains Kim Parker
Nature's own cathedral
Our tallest native tree 'most lovely of all', the stately beech creates a shaded environment that few plants can survive. John Lewis-Stempel ventures into the enchanted woods
All that money could buy
A new book explores the lost riches of London's grand houses. Its author, Steven Brindle, looks at the residences of plutocrats built by the nouveaux riches of the late-Victorian and Edwardian ages
In with the old
Diamonds are meant to sparkle in candlelight, but many now gather dust in jewellery boxes. To wear them today, we may need to reimagine them, as Hetty Lintell discovers with her grandmother's jewellery
