Two Moors

In fact there are many moors but only one that I know like Blacka. From many years ago I have watched the progress of Burbage Moor and Blacka Moor. The tale of these two stretches of landscape, both publicly owned, on either side of the A625 Hathersage Road has been a real tale of two moors and two quite different managements. Not intentionally so. Blacka's lack of management over some 60 years is put down by some to neglect or lack of resources, but it has made it what it is today, while Burbage has been actively managed in the traditional way with sheep grazing and occasional burning of heather. And now we can see the results just before the time comes for consultation on the future of Burbage. The difference is dramatic. Burbage looks the same every day of the year bar a few in August when the heather briefly puts on its glad rags. Winter Spring and Summer come but you would hardly know it, so effectively have sheep eliminated trees. Similarly there has been effective propaganda that can be heard from all quarters telling us that the land has to be managed, which means it has to be farmed and sheep and cattle have to be put on the land - otherwise there will be disastrous consequences so they imply and even state. All of this nonsense is fed to a largely uncritical public in order to frighten them into accepting top down control in the interests of managers and livestock farmers. The alarming truth we are encouraged to believe is that our hills would vapourise were it not for the sheep and cattle that munch (and defecate) their way across the landscape. If you say this kind of thing often enough there's a fair chance you'll start to actually believe it. Your wilful blindness then becomes a conviction that is of some assistance in getting the message across to the the aforesaid uncritical public.

So what chance is there that Burbage after consultation and a number of years will look as bewitching as Blacka did this morning? Only I think if there's an agreement to banish the farmers and the conservationists, the latter exiled to South America preferably where they can find out about real conservation problems instead of opportunistically imagining them here in the comfort of a steady career. Only those who don't use their eyes can reject the values of unmanaged land, the unexpected easily trumping the predictable, the natural beauty triumphing over the industrial wasteland of grouse moors. Despite the worst efforts of SWT here on Blacka we have trees that grow where it suits them, mounds of low shrubby bilberry (try finding any on Burbage!), warblers singing in April and deer roaming between trees and scrub and glades. Only because of the lack of management.