Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[CLKD]

So that I don't bore the pants off those 4 those reading the 'in or out thread' 


The Bedford Level Corporation (or alternatively the Corporation of the Bedford Level) was founded in England in 1663 to manage the draining of the Fens of East Central England. It formalised the legal status of the Company of Adventurers previously formed by the Duke of Bedford to reclaim 95,000 acres of the Bedford Level.


The low-lying land of East Central England, known as the Fens, consisted traditionally of semi-continuous marshland and peat bog interspersed with isolated patches of higher ground. Agriculture has only been made possible by a co-ordinated system of drainage ditches. During medieval times this was controlled by the great monasteries in the area but fell into disrepute after the dissolution. By the 1600s the general drainage situation was so bad that King Charles I invited Cornelius Vermuyden, the Dutch engineer, to devise a scheme to drain the Great Fen.

The Great Fen, lying between the Wash and Cambridge, is more popularly known as the Bedford Level after Francis Russell, 4th Earl of Bedford, (Woburn Abbey) who owned a large part of it. It covers some 300,000 acres in the historical counties of Northamptonshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire and much of it lies below sea level. It was divided under Vermuyden's plan into three areas, North, Middle and South Level.

In recent years the drainage system has been updated to the cost of £M87 - at Denver Sluice the Gates have been repaired and updated in order to protect the area for years to come. 

Sir Peter Scott began the Wetlands Trust at Slimbridge and there is a large 'natural' wash area near Welney which is great to visit.  Swans are there over Winter, there is a good cafe and small shop.  It incorporates one of the drains as well as buying acres of land to protect many wading birds.  The Washes are Welney are flooded under controlled situations to protect the surrounding villages and when it's really cold, there are ice skating competitions held ............

At Thorney [where that MP was found speeding but denied the Charge] was an Abbey and payment was by eels - annually the locals had to provide thousands of eels ....... now these are as rare as hens' teeth 

[Shadyglade]

I would have a lye down CLKD. 

You must feel really drained after that. 

[Kathleen]

CLKD, with this post you have excelled yourself ! 

Take care.

K.

PS Good to know that the great monasteries in the area were no strangers to disrepute, somethings never change!

PPS I've been to Welney in the winter and a more bleak landscape is frankly hard to imagine.

Take care.

K.

[AgathaC]

I would recommend some Vagisil for the dried up old Fens xxx

[CLKD]

Not so much of the old 

[CLKD]

I did too, here it is ;-)

Lincolnshire etc. note to self: read Link 

One can keep up with Nicholas on the Farm at Deeping St Nicholas - name I can't remember, bugga ......

[Tc]

CLKD. Maybe you should move to Swaffham. . An elderly local man once told me "nuffin ever 'appens in Swaaaaarfam".

[CLKD]

Peddling along to Swaffham then ;-)

[dahliagirl]

Ely Cathedral is well worth a visit too.  It is fascinating to see all the niches with the remains of saints' feet, the remains of mediaeval paint, and the labyrinth on the floor to follow for those who could not go on pilgrimage. Also worth paying the extra to go up the tower and see the views for miles.

Most cathedrals have really nice cafes and really good tours - you learn loads of history.  Better than the NT  You can use your entrance ticket all year.

[dahliagirl]

I really enjoyed Chichester last year, which has nice gardens and art, and Winchester which is much bigger and disappointingly has been knocked down and rebuilt since the Kings of England were crowned there.  Still, that is all part of their (and our) history along with fallen towers, floods, desecration during the civil war and all the changes with the dissolution.  They are very much living places that are always changing.

I told my trainee-deacon friend I thought they were a good place to visit for the tearooms and he was a bit  but 

[CLKD]

Love Ely.  We go there often.  I have an artist's proof of a drawing which hangs in the Restaurant area which is slightly different to the one hanging on my bedroom wall.  ? might be worth a bit ? 

Never felt comfortable in the Broads  ........ Fens are too wide  and I never feel clean when we go back to visit.  So much history in that area ............

[CLKD]

Vine House Farm
Deeping St James

not far from Spalding ...... they sell farm grown bird feed, do intensive surveys, grow spuds for chipping ........ and send out a monthly e-mail to those interested in farming practices and progress. 

[CLKD]

I thought we had one somewhere    [we do, places mentioned in the Holiday 2019 thread ;-) ]

The Fens wouldn't be my first choice  but needs must 

[CLKD]

Yesterday I asked a question of a Farmer regarding the worry [on the Brexit thread] about food requirements:

I expect that we produce more food than we did 30 years ago as yields per acre keep going up.

There is not likely to be a crash in what we produce, we may produce a bit less if all the houses are built that government want building.

We do of course have to import about 50% of our food anyway.

Pleased you enjoy reading the newsletter.

As a farmer I do not consider I should be trying to feed the world, I feel I should be making a living and pass my business on to the next generation and leave my farm in a better state than when I started farming.

Regards

[sheila99]

He doesn't read farmers weekly, they think we're only 40% self sufficient. I wish I had his magic wand though, our land produces pretty much the same each year. With more pesticides being banned and more unusual weather I would have thought yield is liable to reduce like it did last year because of drought.
  No chance of feeding the world, we can't even feed our own country.
  We're guaranteed to produce less with the reduction in acreage because of house building. Have you noticed they always build on the best most productive land? Huge new housing estates in Cheshire where each acre produces 3 times as much as our land in Derbyshire. In our small town 1 allocated site is ex commercial, the other 3 are greenfield, but not just any fields, it is all the most productive land. All of them are meadows (used for hay/silage as opposed to pasture which can only be used for grazing). 2 of the sites are ours and without them the farm becomes unviable as there won't be enough winter fodder. We can't buy alternative meadow land nearby, there isn't any. The third site is liable to make another farm unviable for the same reason.