I took my children to Burpham Court Farm Park this morning for a little outing.  It’s an ideal morning out  because it’s so close, the kids love to feed the animals, play and have a picnic, and farmer Bob is full of interesting facts and happy to show the children what he’s doing.  I also like to pick up some local non-intensively reared meat for the freezer while we are there.

Our chat with farmer Bob today wasn’t as upbeat as usual.  He is a man with the weight of the world on his shoulders.  He has been having problems with the National Trust, who have flooded his land more than 20 times in the past three years by opening its weir gates fully across the Wey Navigation, flooding fields, ruining hay crops so that his cattle are starving and introducing liver fluke to water logged pastures where over 70 sheep died before the parasite was discovered.

The crux of the matter is that farmer Bob, a tenant farmer who has put his heart and soul into conserving rare breeds and educating local children about farming in an environmentally friendly manner is now impoverished, struggling to keep the farm open and as a result of him having taken on the "big boys" and lost is facing having to cover the legal costs of the National Trust and Guildford council, a whopping £400,000.   If you’re interested in farmer Bob’s story, read his full account of what has happened here.