Philip Metcalfe, Usha Gap, Swaledale

Usha Gap farm sits among fields in Lower Swaledale, between Thwaite and Muker. Extended over the years, the farm has been in the Metcalfe family since the 1930s. Philip runs it with his father; he is in partnership with his parents and his wife, Louise, whose main focus is the upkeep and running of the campsite.

All of Philip’s 900 breeding ewes are Swaledales and he keeps a largely pure flock, with a small amount of the Swaledales crossed with a Bluefaced Leicester to produce Mules. Each year he sells his gimmer (female) lambs on for breeding, and most of his Swaledale tup lambs are sold on: he’ll keep a few of the better ones back with a view to selling them when they are older.

Philip also keeps 40 Limousin-cross cows, but admits that his passion is Swaledale sheep. At the moment he’s not doing a lot of showing. ‘It’s specialised. I’d like to, but we haven’t just got anything good enough. You have to have something really good at home before you even dream of setting off.’ For Swaledale sheep, the top two shows are Tan Hill (in May) and Muker (in September). ‘If you can win either of them, you’ve kind of made it.’

Despite not showing at the moment, Philip is on the committee at both shows and helps with organisation. It’s important, he thinks, for the local community and for the wider network of hill farmers. It’s a huge area that the breed covers: Derbyshire, Scotland, the Lake District, North Yorkshire Moors and Northumberland. You know most people – it’s a small world, farming really. If you don’t know the person you’re talking to, they’ll know someone you know.’

Like most farmers, Philip has seen a fall in the number of people working on the farm. He farms now with his father (‘he’s retired, but farmers don’t really retire, they just slow

Voices From the Land, 2017. Interview by Harriet Fraser Article and Photographs © Harriet Fraser and Rob Fraser

down.’). He has help one day a week from another man. ‘He’s off a farm but in the ‘90s when farming was really bad, he trained as an electrician. A lot of people went away to get other trades, other jobs, and a lot didn’t come back. If you’re on a decent wage, getting four, five-hundred quid a week, farming can’t compete with that. But he works on his own farm as well.’

Philip’s inbye land consists of around 700 acres, a combination of fields and pastures, each one surrounded by dry stone walls. This is characteristic of Lower Swaledale, where the sloped sides of the dale are segmented into small fields. Philip says that tourists who stop and talk to him, curious about the regions, frequently ask about the walls and the field barns, and he’s happy to explain the origins of small fields for each family that gained an income from mining, and the presence of field barns in most fields for storing hay and giving shelter to cows. ‘The earliest enclosures are where the ground’s better. Then in the 1840s, they found straight lines so the big pastures all have straight walls after that.’

Usha Gap has some large, modern buildings for cattle and for storing machinery, and also has nine field barns that are used all the time, with others that are opened up during lambing. Most are used for storing hay, and one has been amended with the addition of a big door at one end to make it more accessible for machinery. Like the walls, the barns are a striking feature of Swaledale which has, it is said, more than a thousand. ‘They are a lot of upkeep,’ says Philip, who has one that may soon be beyond economic repair ‘I don’t know. Do you let the slates fall in, tumble in, make it look a mess? Do you take it down? I don’t know what you do with it. If it’s just the roof, that’s not that bad, it’s when the walls are going. Even with the 20% grant that you used to get in the HLS for them, well they can cost 40, 50 grand. If it’s unusable, that’s a lot of money to tie up really.’

The commons have been The farm also has grazing rights for 900 sheep on three stinted since about 1840, so commons: Muker Common, Ivelet Moor and Ivelet Pasture. Muker Common and Ivelet Moor are both they can only carry so many classified as Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), sheep. But there have been ‘They’re in good condition, nice heather and things.’ that many sheep taken off, you have to keep them together. In The commons are all stinted: a stint allocates a specific years gone by, there’d be number and type of animals that an individual right another farmer. If there’s holder may graze. ‘They’ve been stinted since about 1840, so they can only carry so many sheep. So it’s sheep next to sheep, they don’t never been over stocked or abused that way.’ wander but if there’s nothing on it they’ll just set off. There are fewer active graziers than there once were though: Philip is one of two on Ivelet Moor, where there would once have been flocks from a further five or six farms, and on Muker Common, only three active graziers remain out of seven. Only one common has sheep on over the winter, when they need to be fed. ‘I go and feed them with hay and cake,’ says Philip. ‘There have been that many sheep taken off, you have to keep them together; if not they can wander off. In years gone by, there’d be another farmer. If there’s sheep next to sheep, they don’t wander but if there’s nothing on it they’ll just set off. It’s their instinct to spread onto somewhere clean and fresh.’

Voices From the Land, 2017. Interview by Harriet Fraser Article and Photographs © Harriet Fraser and Rob Fraser

For additional income, Usha Gap has run a campsite for many years, and Louise took over the management from Philip’s mother. Following the success of the ‘Tour de France in 2014, which brought thousands of tourists to the dale, Louise was able to upgrade the old milking parlour to create a new amenity block for campers. The site is open all year, even in winter. ‘To be fair,’ says Philip, ‘probably the best time is January when it’s keen frost. You can see for miles, nobody about, when you’re out on the tops.’

Much of the inbye land falls within a Higher Level Stewardship Scheme: it can’t be fertilised, nor can it be cut before July 15th, which gives the yellow rattle and other wildflowers and grasses time to lay down seed. This can cause a problem in terms of hay making, as July tends to be a wetter month than June, but, says Philip, ‘you’re governed by the weather whatever you want to do up here.’

Up here if there isn’t any support The meadows have been within schemes since the ESA or any environmental schemes, I (Environmentally Sensitive Area) payments were don’t know what will happen. introduced in the 1980s to encourage farmers to keep We have to have something in meadows: the payments made up for additional costs the farmers incurred by farmers, for instance buying extra these hills otherwise it will feed, because the meadows cannot be fertilised and may intensify, or be ranched, which not produce as much grass and nutrition as what’s called will be equally as bad. ‘improved’ land.

Recent agreements have ‘cherry picked the best bits’ says Philp, and this concerns him. ‘There’s one or two bits that weren’t as good further down the dale that are no longer in schemes: farmers have reseeded them – they’ve little choice. Yes, they weren’t as good, but they’re lost now, you can’t get them back. They’ve sprayed them off and direct-sowed rye grass so that field’s lost for ever as a meadow. And you can see, driving down dale, even in winter when everything else is white, they’re still very green, the reseeded ones.’ Philip prefers the meadows to the treated grasslands. ‘You can go anywhere and see intensive fields – there aren’t many areas like this left any more.’

There is a great deal of uncertainty at the moment, not just with schemes changing, but also with the date of Brexit approaching. Philip has two sons, one of whom is keen to farm, and I wonder what kind of future Philip thinks his son is heading into. He gives a simple, one-word answer. ‘Grim,’ before continuing: ‘Up here if there isn’t any support or any environmental schemes, I don’t know what will happen. If you’ve a rented farm you can give it up, just walk away. We own it, so we can’t do that. My dad says, well you’ll always want food. They should do, but think they can import it cheaper, and to be fair the little bit we make up here, we don’t produce that much.’

Philip is concerned about where the main decisions are going to originate. ‘With leaving Europe, everything’s in the air. Defra don’t know what they’re doing. They’ve got a knowledge deficit at the top I think, Defra and bodies like that – NFU, CLA.’ Philip has been involved in a panel discussing High Nature Value Farming and talks about a pilot scheme offering ‘payment by results’ that is happening in Wensleydale. ‘You get your land surveyed and you get a certain rate of payment for it. If you improve it, nature value, you get a higher

payment, and if you do something and it goes worse, you get less payment. I think it’s a brilliant idea.’ In this scheme, farmers are in a position to contribute their observations. This is a good thing, says Philip: ‘they’ve never listened to us. All these years, they should have been talking to and interviewing the old farmers that have been doing it for years and years. There’s a reason it is as it is – it’s not by accident. Listen. The whole landscape’s because of farming, traditional farming methods.’ Philip continues, ‘We have to have something in these hills otherwise it will intensify, or be ranched, which will be equally as bad.’

For the moment, though, Philip is in a scheme, and waiting to see what will happen. Autumn is approaching and it’s his favourite time of year. ‘It’s tupping time. The pures, you have your yows and you have your tups, and you’re trying to match them up to get the good points off both of them. It’s optimistic – you know, lambing time brings the reality but now, it’s a time that’s full of hope.’ If there’s an opposite time of year, it’s the end of the lambing season. ‘You start off full of enthusiasm, and it drags on and it drags on and you lose lambs, and it gets to be hard work. The bad side is when it’s snowing and they’re still lambing and you’re trying to get them going.’ Having said that, when all the hard work’s over, there’s a special quality that makes Philip smile. ‘Seeing lambs when they’re what we’d say laking, when they’re running round on a hillside, the sun is shining, they’re enjoying life, they’re growing and they’re playing. That’s the good side.’

It’s one of many things that keeps Philip doing what he’s doing – the last of the Metcalfes in his family, until, if it happens, his own son takes over. ‘You’re a bit like the sheep, you’re hoofed on your little area, a technical term – heafed, hefted, we call it hoofed. You like living where you are. I don’t know where I’d go if I weren’t here.’

You’re a bit like the sheep, you’re hoofed on your little area, a technical term – heafed, hefted, we call it hoofed. You like living where you are. I don’t know where I’d go if I weren’t here.

Lower Swaledale, with its distinctive barns and field patterns

www.dalesfarmers.co.uk