The Changing Countryside

I walk from my home whatever the weather.

Sometimes, I walk with my wife to the pub and back, a circular route of about six miles along quiet, narrow lanes. At other times, I’ll head off down a steep farm track to the woodland in a meandering river valley at the bottom of our garden. Sadly, our old yellow lab is no longer interested in joining me. He has no strength in his hind legs and he can’t climb precipitous slopes or jump over fallen trees.

It’s lonely now without him there, but it does mean I can walk slower and quieter and more purposefully.

Around here in the deep countryside, you don’t see many folk. In the woods I walk through, there are no public footpaths. It would be very unusual to see anyone at all. You’d think this would mean that animals and birds would be in abundance in such a secluded place, but it’s not so, at least not in the winter and not in daylight.

The English countryside is an empty place in winter.

I can walk through the woodland all afternoon and maybe see a squirrel or two and possibly I might disturb a sedentary red deer. There would be some pigeons but not much else.

Of course, if I were very skilled and very patient, I could winkle out more life of some sort, like in natural history TV programmes, but that’s not my point. My point is that even if you didn’t know much about nature, you might expect that in a wild, isolated wilderness like this there would be more stuff around.

What I want to know is: has it always been like this? – or is it another sign that the English countryside and the things that live in it are in retreat?

Who could I ask?

Well, I think it always was empty. In an English wildwood in the winter, there’s not much food to go around. There never was much food. I think that’s interesting.