Planning permission sought for mobile phone mast near Bullpot farm

[Flotsam]

What people are trying to say is that it’s not a *natural* landscape - pretty much a defining characteristic of upland moors is that they don’t exist without ongoing human management, and in this country they are generally maintained that way to benefit the very small percentage of people who enjoy blasting birds out of the sky.

I used to stay at an house in a Welsh semi upland shooting estate. Lots of sheep, pheasants,buzzards and kites but virtually nothing else. Good potential badger and fox territory but never saw any evidence of one in many nights staying there. There were some rabbits, the population appeared to succumb to a disease, possibly myxomatosis over a year or two. The shooting which occurred regularly resembled WW1. The area was a wildlife dessert.

There was absolutely zero mobile phone coverage BTW. To give an insight, a local farmer complained about the poor quality internet. He had to do all his Tax and DEFRA stuff online and it was very poor.

 

[2xw]

I hate wildlife free grouse moors like the one I live on. All those lapwings, curlews, grey partridge and moorhens in my garden, the ring ouzels that nest at the bottom of the field, the grouse that perch on my washing line, the pairs of golden plovers and barn owls behind the house…. Barren wildlife free zones…. All us awful farmers letting sheep graze the moors (in numbers so small the Heather is now so long that it’s massively fire loaded so a fire will ruin the peat)
I end up on my soap box about this but it’s very wearing constantly hearing people who like visiting the dales and like caving also tell “us” who work in the landscape what a shit job we do of it. With some of the attitudes you see some cavers display it’s no wonder there are tense relationships between cavers and farmers/gamekeepers/land owners sometimes!

Yes, of course an area managed as a bird farm has some pretty good habitat for birds. It's just a shame you've missed out all the stuff that's missing, which along with the Farthing Wood bits people seem keen on, includes a massive amount of important botanical and microbiological diversity which has been repeatedly f****d not just by grouse farms but also by sheep, by post WWII draining/land reclamation, by (windborne) pollution legacies from (in the area we're discussing) Manchester, Leeds and the M1, by quarrying and various extractive industries (including for the peat itself) and by pernicious overhunting.

This is all fine - it's a working landscape, but as others have pointed out, my point was that moaning about a mast in the midst of all of that is really rather silly. Not only has the horse bolted on the "wild landscape" issue, but it's been shot in the head and shipped off to Tesco.


And don't worry - my point wasn't coming from the perspective of a caver, but from the perspective of an expert in upland land management. Most of the farmers and land managers I have relationships with would really rather I talk about caving

 

[JAA]

I guess it’s hard not to feel a little prickly when people keep on about the barren wilderness aspect! Usually because countryfile or Chris packham has told them that’s what it is. And equally everyone will have different things they think are important ecologically and landscape wise!
Mostly I think let’s life in the modern world. I live in Swaledale. In the 1800’s the most industrialised area in Western Europe and covered in ruined industry. It’s just industrial wreckage that probably looks quite scenic now. But it’s wouldn’t have then. And they’d have defintely built a mast and not thought twice!

 

[pwhole]

Indeed - and 'hushing' for near-surface lead ore used to rip out an entire hillside in a few minutes, using dammed water instantaneously released.