Upland Offer - "Assessment of Eligibility for Permanent Grassland"

Alchad

Member
Only a hobby farmer with 40 acres, was going to apply for a Upland Offer based on permanent grassland and haymaking supplement with hedge keeping as a second option. However just flicking through the various guides etc and came across this beauty regarding record keeping

Countryside Stewardship Assessment of eligibility for permanent grassland (publishing.service.gov.uk)

Extract....
This table is provided for you to keep a record of the species identified in the parcels selected for GS2, GS5, GS6 or OT2, where this is the qualifying criteria being applied in Table 1. A range of less common or widespread wildflowers are found in more species-rich grassland and should be recorded if identified. Typical grass species are cock’s-foot, common bent, crested dog’s-tail, creeping bent, false oatgrass, meadow fescue, meadow foxtail, red fescue, sweet vernal grass, Timothy tufted hair-grass and Yorkshirefog. Typical wildflower species of semi-improved grassland are Autumn hawkbit, black medick, burnet saxifrage, bulbous buttercup, common cat’s-ear, common fleabane, common sorrel, creeping cinquefoil, crosswort, cuckooflower, field woodrush, germander speedwell, hedge bedstraw, lesser trefoil, ribwort plantain, meadow buttercup, red clover, self-heal, smooth hawksbeard, tufted vetch, wild carrot and yarrow. Typical species of species-rich grassland/unimproved grassland, depending on the actual type, are agrimony, betony, black knapweed, bugle, common bird’s-foot trefoil, common meadow-rue, common rock rose, cowslip, devil’s-bit scabious, eyebrights, fairly flax, great burnet, harebell, hawkbits, lady’s bedstraw, marsh valerian, marsh marigold, meadowsweet, milkwort, mouse-ear hawkweed, orchids, ragged robin, salad burnet, thyme, tormentil, wood anemone, yellow rattle, small sedges


Seriously....I'm supposed to survey my fields and identify which of these I have???

I really, really with Jeremy Clarkson could do a segment on this, it would be priceless.

Just not worth it for £1500 a year.
 

GeorgeK

Member
Location
Leicestershire
Don't do it, Natural England will turn your hobby into a millstone round your neck. They love insisting that the ever changing natural world is measured and quantified then when they turn up to check and it's inevitably slightly different they'll have you for it.
 

Ffermer Bach

Member
Livestock Farmer
or a worst case scenario is, they come and inspect and make it a SSSI and then you are really skewered, if the farm is a hobby I would not even entertain it for £1500, maybe if no one enrols on any of these schemes, they might think we have to re write the rules, or more likely the response would be like the Labour party after the last election, "the voters got it wrong by not voting for us".
 

linga

Member
Location
Ceredigion
Only a hobby farmer with 40 acres, was going to apply for a Upland Offer based on permanent grassland and haymaking supplement with hedge keeping as a second option. However just flicking through the various guides etc and came across this beauty regarding record keeping

Countryside Stewardship Assessment of eligibility for permanent grassland (publishing.service.gov.uk)

Extract....
This table is provided for you to keep a record of the species identified in the parcels selected for GS2, GS5, GS6 or OT2, where this is the qualifying criteria being applied in Table 1. A range of less common or widespread wildflowers are found in more species-rich grassland and should be recorded if identified. Typical grass species are cock’s-foot, common bent, crested dog’s-tail, creeping bent, false oatgrass, meadow fescue, meadow foxtail, red fescue, sweet vernal grass, Timothy tufted hair-grass and Yorkshirefog. Typical wildflower species of semi-improved grassland are Autumn hawkbit, black medick, burnet saxifrage, bulbous buttercup, common cat’s-ear, common fleabane, common sorrel, creeping cinquefoil, crosswort, cuckooflower, field woodrush, germander speedwell, hedge bedstraw, lesser trefoil, ribwort plantain, meadow buttercup, red clover, self-heal, smooth hawksbeard, tufted vetch, wild carrot and yarrow. Typical species of species-rich grassland/unimproved grassland, depending on the actual type, are agrimony, betony, black knapweed, bugle, common bird’s-foot trefoil, common meadow-rue, common rock rose, cowslip, devil’s-bit scabious, eyebrights, fairly flax, great burnet, harebell, hawkbits, lady’s bedstraw, marsh valerian, marsh marigold, meadowsweet, milkwort, mouse-ear hawkweed, orchids, ragged robin, salad burnet, thyme, tormentil, wood anemone, yellow rattle, small sedges


Seriously....I'm supposed to survey my fields and identify which of these I have???

I really, really with Jeremy Clarkson could do a segment on this, it would be priceless.

Just not worth it for £1500 a year.
You don’t do it yourself. You employ an “expert” or “consultant” and your £1500 will go part way to paying him …. Or her
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

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  • Up to 25%

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  • 25-50%

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  • 50-75%

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  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 5 2.7%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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  • 1
As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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