A summer’s evening and once again Sudbury’s water meadows reveal some of their magic. While we sit on the riverbank on Kings Marsh, a dozen or so house martins fill the space around us, putting on a breath-taking aerial display…

At this time of high summer, out on the riverside pastures the cattle are fattening well as they eat down the acres of herbage. The visual impact of the spring flora has long since passed and apart from some wonderful…

High summer is the time of damsels and dragons. However, far from being in distress, the damsels positively cavort around the riverside in all their colourful finery. The dragons on the other hand are less interested in eating the damsels,…

Whilst both farming and conservation work is carried out year round on the riverside to ensure that the aims of the management plans are met, it is really at this time of year that the fruits of many years of…

The Sudbury Common Lands pastures have a long-recorded history of grazing stretching back to the twelfth century. Over eight hundred years later this historical connection continues. Without cattle, the incredibly long cultural tradition would be broken and with it much…

The nineteenth century American poet and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson considered ‘that man had once been at one with nature’. Now as we witness the enormous loss of nature, policies try to reflect the need to reconnect with it. This…

Within our hearts we all celebrate as winter’s grip is slowly replaced by the more benign and softer days of spring even though we have experienced a very mild one. Instead, the winter was characterised by several tree-damaging storms and…

Working with animals brings a range of issues and problems whether it be injured swans or grazing livestock from a lame or sick cow to corralling cattle for general treatment or removal at the end of the season. Over the…

The weather is probably still the nation’s favourite topic in spite of the many distractions of modern life. There is no doubt that weather events over the past two years have been somewhat extreme although they are very soon forgotten.…

As the end of the year approaches it is a good time to pause and reflect on what has been; the joys and the disappointments of the seasons on the riverside. The joy, of course, lies in the landscape and…