This week I worked alongside the grazier and his team to install the gates for the exclosures that make up the Quarry Life experiment. The experiment will have three replicate plots for treatments with winter grazing, summer grazing and year-round grazing. Year-round grazing is the control treatment as this is typical of the area. Sets of plots have been set up in both the pavement and the calcareous grassland. The small exclosures (5 x 5 m) can be moved from one location to another so every spring and autumn the exclosures will be shifted across to the adjacent plot with locations marked with either a spot spray paint on the pavement or buried metal plates which can be found using a metal detector in the grassland. The site will be grazed by sheep with the animals on for a month over winter and two two-week periods over summer. The sheep will be Swaledales, a Yorkshire breed that are hardy and well suited to the Dales. Hopefully within a few years we will have evidence to show which grazing regime is more effective for biodiversity conservation.

I must confess, I had been a little bit worried about how easy it would be to get big heavy gates onto the pavement but I had completely overestimated how light modern gates are. We were helped by the site being dry and the sun shining. The grazier and his team made the job look really easy while I tried to help and did my best not to get in the way! The end result is non-intrusive and effective, I am very pleased them. The sheep will arrive later this week and we will collect the first survey data this month.

It was also great to chat about grazing in the area and learn more about farming. We are highly dependent on farmers to maintain important habitats like calcareous grasslands and limestone pavement so learning from their experience and expertise is important.

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