Country diary: A question of land use that has no easy answers | Kate Blincoe

Caistor St Edmund, Norfolk: This farmland is not ours and we like to share it with walkers, but this delicate balance may soon be upsetThe massive oak trunk lies close to where it fell, now carved into a bench. I sit there, feeling the balm of long-awaited spring sunshine on my face. Across the valley, the hay meadows are greening up, promising bales and bales of goodness for the horses. The hum of the bypass is, for a few minutes, overpowered by the piercing trill of a skylark, rising up just a few metres from me, rising up just a few metres from me. I smile at the walkers passing by. As spring revives the landscape, so too does it beckon people.Much of the local countryside here is inaccessible, often behind barbed wire and "keep out" signs. Here at High Ash Farm, miles of wide grass tracks are freely accessible to the public; my dad has even created a small parking area for walkers. Being close to a city brings some difficulties, but also opportunities to share nature. It means hundreds of people care about the farm and become unofficial custodians, picking up litter and reporting broken fences. Maybe, as tenant farmers, my brother and dad have an in-built knowledge that this land is not theirs to possess. Continue reading...