BS: Enclosure patterns

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 07:28 PM

Occasionally, prehistoric hilltop burial sites are crowned with circular plantings of trees. There's Kirkcarrion in Teesdale and one much nearer to me, a prominent landmark by the A30, between Okehampton and Launceston (can't find a name for that one) that I know of. There'll be others, I'm sure. Where exactly was it?

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 05:46 PM

Some modern developments are given quaint names in an attempt to make them sound traditional. There is a small estate of newish houses in Sandhurst, built on what used to be the yard and garages of a coach (bus) hire firm - the local council have named it "Coachman's Grove".

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: JHW
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 04:07 PM

'a field with a dense and perfectly round stand of trees in it'
Rabbit warrens are like that. Used to contain wild rabbits for the eating of.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 03:52 PM

My uncle and aunt used to live in Ram Gorse! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 01:15 PM

Sixth mass extinction - precisely my point. Earth has been there before. But the likelihood is that we'll not just be bringing about this mass extinction, it will include us.
.............

Old field names - one likable things about living where I do, in the New Town of Harlow, is that the old field and wood names have survived, because they have been used for the neighbourhoods where people live - names like Spinning Wheel Mead, Parsonage Leys, Ram Gorse, hundreds more.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 11:08 AM

On our flight into Heathrow, we passed over a field with a dense and perfectly round stand of trees in it. Does anybody have any idea what that was?

We have a photograph of it, so we know it was there.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 06:21 AM

It's frightening but true: Our planet is now in the midst of its sixth mass extinction of plants and animals — the sixth wave of extinctions in the past half-billion years. We're currently experiencing the worst spate of species die-offs since the loss of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Although extinction is a natural phenomenon, it occurs at a natural "background" rate of about one to five species per year. Scientists estimate we're now losing species at 1,000 to 10,000 times the background rate, with literally dozens going extinct every day. It could be a scary future indeed, with as many as 30 to 50 percent of all species possibly heading toward extinction by mid-century. [Center for Biological Diversity website]

OK, one or two weasel words in there, but this is typical of many references you can find to the current man-made mass extinction. I don't think it's necessarily an alarmist view. Dunno about that level of extinction, but there's no doubt that losing diversity is disastrous.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 04:58 AM

But Planet Earth isn't worried.

It ought to be. I know I am.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 04:50 AM

"Aye. It were thirty year ago, when I faced that old bull at Fishponds. It were the year my brother, James, married that Candleford woman. By hem, but she were near! She were that near she 'udn't give away enough to make a pair of leggings for a skylark." ;)

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: JHW
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 04:04 AM

When all the little fields had names and countless people worked those lands with sweat and tears was when they used to relax after work by singing each other songs...

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 03:41 AM

We had a walk on one side of Airedale on Thursday, along a lane with lovely hedgerows. Yesterday we walked the other side of the valley, on the higher moors amidst the drystone walls. Both sides gave us views of the patchwork fields. There are miles of both round here! Lucky us :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 12 Sep 15 - 02:53 AM

Anyway, I shall be driving accross the patchwork quilt to Worthing today, so I'll just imagine the view from 5000 feet!

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 06:37 PM

Planet Earth's survival isn't in doubt. Our survival is. Especially our survival as a civilisation.

Sadly, I suspect it's likely to get a lot worse before it might start getting better.

But Planet Earth isn't worried.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 09:42 AM

Yeah, but we're running out of time.

Personally I think we passed the point of no return a long time ago. The bastards who hold the power are just placating us to stave of the inevitable breakdown in societal order when people finally wise up and go on the final apocalptic rampage.

On the bright side, humanity's descent into lawlessness, violence, dystopian misrule leading to some sort of diminished token human presence haunting the fringes of post-civilisation could well be the only chance for Planet Earth's survival...   either that or the arrival of some extra-terrestial super-intelligence to show us the way, but chances are they'd tae one look at the situation and remove the Human Infection from this once perfect and precious jewel we seem hell bent on turning into a cinder all too prematurely.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 09:27 AM

O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us.
To edit oor posts, they same as they does...

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 09:26 AM

Yeah, but we're running out of time.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 09:20 AM

I was ruling out covering half of Scotland and Wales with windmills and solar cells...

No need if humanity got its shit together, but what are the chances? I think we'd rather destroy the planet than face basic realities...

This Area Would Be Enough to Power the Whole World with Solar Energy.

If a thing's wort doing....

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 06:08 AM

Kevin, point taken, but is the lead-in for other alternatives to fossil fuels any shorter? Of course, I was ruling out covering half of Scotland and Wales with windmills and solar cells...

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 04:48 AM

Just to point out that I wasn't knocking the whole concept of renewable energy, just solar panels and windmills. The whole problem with other renewables is that the research and investment is NOT being put in on anything like the world-wide scale needed. We won't do that and we are too badly behaved to conserve, so that's why I came to my sad conclusion that only nuclear will do.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 11 Sep 15 - 04:00 AM

Wind farms, Nuclear power stations and Land fills - just three of the patterns in the British countryside future generations are REALLY going to thank us for. And the National Grid.

Alternative means of generating power needs alternative thinking. One of these high-tech whirligigs might work if it served a specific community who were geared up to using greener energy - well insulated houses with batteries (for when the wind ain't blowin'), solar panels and the like. As it is they're just waving in a new generation of nuclear power stations whilst ruining what's left of our traditional land & sea scapes.

I've heard it said that if all the concrete needed to keep these wretched things upright had been put into hydro-electric schemes we could have slashed electric tariffs by 70%. Not without it's problems (though I'm not suggesting anything on the Three Gorges scale, however so impressive its output) but how many dams are there in the UK, great and small, that aren't generating electricity? And how much would they be if they were?

The answer, my friends, is most certainly not blowing in the wind.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 08:30 PM

The renewable technologies of today are in their infancy. If serious effort is put into developing all the range of ways of harvesting and using the energy all around us supplied by the sun - solar, wind, wave, water - and the others from the earth itself and the moon - tidal, thermal - we will have more than would know what to do with it.

Nuclear power is a short-term fix, with consequences our descendants will have to cope with for thousands of years, and with such a long lead in before it can be available that the tehnology will probably be completely outdated, and very possibly never used.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 06:37 PM

Life in earth means worms, nematodes, fungi and bacteria. Life on earth is what I meant.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 06:35 PM

Radioactive waste is a big issue, but at least it can be confined to relatively small areas. The products of fossil fuel burning cannot be confined. They are a threat to all of life in earth. Wind turbines and solar panels are yesterday's inefficient and unreliable technology. They simply can't provide the energy we need yet they make us feel good about using energy. We need to feel bad about using energy, not good, and make a far mightier effort to conserve it than we do now. Hey, yank, how many mpg does your car do? Hey, city slicker, how many hours per week do you spend in your air-conditioned building that has windows that don't open?

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST,Guest: theleveller
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 05:18 PM

Three of the best books on the landscape are The History of the Countryside and Trees and Woodlands in the British Landscape by Oliver Rackham, who sadly died earlier this year, and The Making of the British Landscape by Francis Pryor.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 04:49 PM

Thanks for that Leeneia, looks like a good buy.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 04:08 PM

To get back the original topic:

Bonzo, a month ago I was flying over England and noticed the same fields you describe. I took a picture to show friends in the Midwest how different the fields are from the rectangular fields of home.

If you like to study the land, a wonderful book is "Britain from the Air" by Jason Hawkes, which you can buy for a small sum plus shipping at amazon. Here's the URL:

http://www.amazon.com/Britain-Air-Jason-Hawkes/dp/0749565659/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1441915473&sr=1-1&keywords=Britain+from+the+air

This fascinating book is one of the treasures of my library.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: olddude
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 04:04 PM

For me Ireland and Scotland have the best

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: The Sandman
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 03:11 PM

"Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw - PM
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 12:28 PM

"You don't understand how wind-farms are preferable to coal fired power stations?"

I will make enemies, but the only answer is nuclear power. Wind turbines simply make us feel better about wasting energy"
no, depends on what nuclear system you are talking about, there are two.
the one that is used at present leaves very dangerous radioactive waste., check out three mile island. I do not think Wind turbines are good either but they contribute a small amount to the grid and in my opinion they are preferable to the present chosen nuclear system, there are other alternative energy systems, wave power, solar power, which if used in conjunction with wind turbines can also contribute, for example the city of Bergen, uses tidal power.
Steve, you are a diddypoll.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 02:47 PM

I agree with Steve on wind farms and nuclear.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 01:05 PM

But of course the Inclosure Acts stole much of the land from the people.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 12:28 PM

"You don't understand how wind-farms are preferable to coal fired power stations?"

I will make enemies, but the only answer is nuclear power. Wind turbines simply make us feel better about wasting energy.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Rapparee
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 11:47 AM

A hero arises!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Penny S.
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 11:45 AM

I noticed, on the Faroes, round the oldest settlements, that the highest parts of the workable land, just before it got too steep, or turned into a vertical wall of basalt, had intermittent banks like lynchets. I couldn't see anyone working on them at the time, but it looked as if it was done to make it possible to go up and scythe the grass without falling down. They certainly weren't used for any crop other than grass. There were grass windrows in some of the lower fields, but we couldn't work out how it dried. One of the Faroese simply said "it was dried". No sign of haycocks, or the supports for them. Or plastic wrapped rolls of silage. And absolutely no way the grass up slope could be cut with machines.

I bored my companions to death over Gatwick commenting on the field patterns, where my family used to live, and so on. A lot of Sussex, east and south of Gatwick, which is obviously on a big flat bit, is too up-and-downy to be worked by huge machines which need the hedges taken down. It's constructed on ridges running East West, with deep valleys cut into the clay in between them, so the field system hasn't been lost to prairie farming, like East Anglia. (Apparently, in the Weald, medieval peasants held small parcels of land for rent, rather than strips for labour, their holding developed from forest clearance, which would have led to the current system, without enclosing the commonland.)

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST, ^*^
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 10:57 AM

Ancient cultures left marks on the land in the New World, as is evident in many cultural heritage areas, and is visible in particular in desert environments where plants haven't concealed the lines and shapes. Parks tend to be situated in the center of cultural landscapes so the "best" is preserved, but you can examine the landscape outside of parks and see the same features extend for many miles.

The colonial history, marks left by migrants from around the world, is much more recent, but they built walls of stones at the edges of fields and planted hedges here also. In places where agribusiness hasn't moved in to manage large swaths of land, those lines are still visible, and still charming to humans and attractive to wildlife.

There are also windfarms in the more open and windy parts of the U.S. We're getting used to the look of them, like Martian craft in the War of the Worlds marching across the landscape.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 10:47 AM

You don't understand how wind-farms are preferable to coal fired power stations?

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 10:33 AM

Why, BWM? Coal-fired power stations are the very opposite, as one might say, to wind farms. Don't understand your point at all.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 10:20 AM

If you lived, as I do, withing close sight of two huge coal-fired power-stations, belching out their filth, you'd take a different view to windfarms.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 08:47 AM

Ah yes, those wind turbines that cover the most beautiful parts of the country like an ugly rash so that capitalism can keep its air conditioning running to keep its badly-designed London power-buildings cool. Those wind turbines.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST,
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 08:29 AM

"I wasn't aware wildlife had any money"

"Paying the price" doesn't always involve money. Have you never heard of someone (or some animal) "paying with his/her life"?

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 07:20 AM

Doug et al: Not too long ago, a nice lady knocked on my door and asked me to sign a petition against a planned wind farm round here. She looked amazed when I declined to do so, saying that I thought wind farms had a distinctive beauty of their own -- like pylons, which were universally hated not too long since, but whose impressive march across the landscape is now appreciated by many. I made her a prediction: "There is no way we can ever know," I said; "but I predict that in 150 years, when technology has moved on, there will be plans to pull all the wind farms down, and nice well-meaning ladies like you will be going from door to door, just as you are doing now, soliciting signatures to a petition headed 'Save our beloved ancient and traditional wind farm'."

She went away without further argument, her petition unsigned by me.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 06:47 AM

I've seen a many miles of beautiful ancient hedgerow destroyed during various road widening schemes over the last few years - and no attempts at replanting either. Others are routinely flailed to within an inch of their sorry lives. I used to love managing old hedgerows; a real honour to get in there at dawn with a nice sharp bill-hook and work until dusk. We did one once, managed it for a few years, then the landowner decided to have it ripped out - two miles and God knows how many hundreds of years (there was a way of calculating the age of a hedge by counting the various species of flora / fauna but I think it's been (mostly) discredited now). To me it was like singing an old Traditional Song but now, after much heartbreak, I think it's fair to say the continuity's been lost - I saw some hedgerows planted a few years back but the last time I passed that way they were gone. Got so bad I abandoned life in the country for a small sea-side town where the only countryside I see is the Lake District hills many miles across Morecambe Bay (and Snowdonia to the south on a clear day!) and inland to the landscapes of Beacon Fell where we've now stopped going because of the hedgerows are now routinely decorated with little black bags of poo by all these nature-loving dog walkers.   

I guess it comes to something when the countryside looks better from an aeroplane. The British countryside is well fucked.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 06:25 AM

"The cost to wildlife was immense"

I wasn't aware wildlife had any money, must mug a hedgehog next time I see one.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 06:24 AM

The hedges planted during the enclosures were sure to attract criticism, weren't they, Doug? However, as fields got bigger to accommodate bigger machines and as monoculture became the order of the day, hedgerows became vital refuges and corridors for wildlife. In other words, their role evolved. They are the good guys now.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 06:18 AM

I remember listening to a wildlife programme on BBC Radio 4 some years ago, where they were reading out letters sent to the Times about changes to the countryside. They rehearsed the well worn arguments about farmers putting profit first, the destruction of our traditional landscape and the loss of habitat for wildlife. However, these letters were written in the late 18th and early 19th centuries and were complaining about the planting of hedgerows to create enclosures. Change "planting" to "ripping out" and they could have been written in the closing years of the 20th century with all the same arguments.

People don't like change and tend to see the worst in anything new. Who knows, in the year 2215, people may look back at wind farms with nostalgia.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 06:09 AM

Near Boscastle, just down the road a bit, there's a field system called the Forrabury Stitches, a set of fields that is still cultivated on a medieval crop rotation pattern.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Stu
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 05:37 AM

All these fields will have had names, each one a distinct place with a unique identity. I love learning field names where they persist. This was part of our connection to the land itself, which we are loosing rapidly.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 05:34 AM

There are a few ridge and furrow fields in Cropredy near Banbury, I remember parking in one of these at Fairport Convention's festival. The trick was to get there early enough to park at the top of the field in case it rained, because lower down quickly became like an ice rink .

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST,Ian
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 05:15 AM

There are still lots of these field patterns visible in the Huddersfield area.

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: GUEST,Raggytash
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 04:47 AM

The field patterns you refer to can still be seen along the coast in North Yorkshire

Subject: RE: BS: Enclosure patterns
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 10 Sep 15 - 04:46 AM

Until recently, farmers received grants to rip out the hedgerow.
The cost to wildlife was immense.