Back in March 2018 when we first came to Maesyfelin Isaf the local farmer Gareth had used the field for grazing his sheep for nigh on 20 years, with permission from the previous owners, using fertiliser and stuff to keep the grass growing long and his sheep well fed. But that was to be the last year as we have since left it alone, other than to let Gareth cut silage last year in return for some favours including digging out the tail race.
Since then we have basically left it alone until recently when we have started to plant a variety of trees, we had a lad who stayed with us for while who was a tree planter and he planted some baby oaks and Alder or something for us. Plus in the last few months we have added a load more, mostly from cuttings which we planted when it was very wet and boggy which have took very well, including a willow tree and again more recently when a guest very kindly donated some more trees including Horse Chestnuts.
At the moment as you can see from the pictures it is very hard to tell anything is there, but they are just about visible and hopefully in the coming weeks as they green up a bit more. The plan is to get the field area to be not exactly re-wilded but hopefully a bit more natural and to replace some of the trees we have had to take out, together with providing screening and a nice place to walk. Hence the mown paths running around, following the river plus a few twist and turn offshoots
We have also over the two years or so slowly removed the wire fencing by the river, firstly because it looked so ugly but also it meant we couldn’t get to the banks to cut down the weeds and stuff. This also had the added effect of allowing the river to once again flow better during floods, as the wire fence weeded up and formed a semi permeable flood barrier so the river ended up being a torrent 6″ or so above the flooded fields, that was in October 2018. These last few months what with the long non grazed grass, the river has been in the field more often but for the most part not seen.
