Helen Mark explores the Lincolnshire Wolds through the poetry of Victorian Laureate, Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

The Lincolnshire Wolds are a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, remote and in some ways little-changed since Tennyson was born here, in the village of Somersby, in 1809.

Helen meets dialect speakers, like Tennyson, whose 'first language was Lincolnshire'. She'll find out how he might have described the landscape and how it appears in some of his dialect poems. She meets some rare farm animals that would have been familiar to him and visits a rookery he describes in his famous poem 'Maud'. We'll hear direct descendants of those very rooks!

Producer: Mary Ward-Lowery. Published on May 5, 2016.

Tennyson's Lincolnshire

Brett Westwood presents a special programme as Open Country joins forces with the European Broadcasting Union and RTE in Ireland to follow the Dawn Chorus from East to West across Europe.

Sunday 1 May was International Dawn Chorus Day and from midnight until six am, Brett Westwood sat in RSPB Ham Wall in Somerset broadcasting about what he heard. The silence of the night is broken by belching Moorhens, booming Bitterns and even a Marsh Frog before Dawn breaks to reveal a huge cast of Coots, Little Grebes and even Brett's first Cuckoo of Spring, to name but a few.

But as the Dawn moves West, Brett speaks to Alexander Khaburgaev in Russia about the Starlings of Moscow which imitate cab drivers from a hundred years ago, and Jason Aloisio describes how tackling illegal hunting has allowed the sparrows of Malta to thrive. Helge Søfteland and Niall Hatch witness a thrilling spat between rival Capercaillie, and Rob Buiter and Eric Dempsey report on Bluethroats in The Netherlands.

Producer: Toby Field. Published on May 12, 2016.

Dawn Chorus across Europe

Helen Mark visits Heathrow Airport to discover what steps they take to encourage biodiversity and assesses the impact the proposed third runway will have should the decision be made for it to go ahead. 

Heathrow has thirteen sites of Conversation, and Helen speaks to to the Airport's Biodiversity Manager Adam Cheeseman about the species he finds there including the Black Bee. Environmental Operations Manager Russell Knight explains how they've encouraged fish species to return to their rivers, and how they plan to create a green fringe around the proposed new runway. Helen also asks how much difference biodiversity can make to a project of this scale. 

She visits Colne Valley Park, part of which will be taken up by the new runway, and asks Stewart Pomeroy about the challenges of balancing the needs of the Park with the need for development, and to Mathew Frith from the London Wildlife Trust about the potential impact on the Park's bird and fish species. She also speaks to Colin Rayner who farms land around Heathrow about what life's like for him now and what he thinks the future will be should permission for a third runway be granted. 

This programme has been amended since first broadcast. Comments made that St Mary's Parish Church and the Great Barn at Harmondsworth were under threat from the proposed third runway were not correct and have been removed.

Producer: Toby Field. Published on July 21, 2016.

Biodiversity at Heathrow

Lancelot 'Capability' Brown is heralded as the Shakespeare of gardening who in the eighteen century designed an estimated 170 landscapes including Blenheim Palace, Warwick Castle and Highclere Castle. To mark the 300th anniversary of his birth, Helen Mark discovers how his naturalistic landscapes changed the face of the countryside in the eighteenth century and continue to endure today. She visits Wrest Park in Bedfordshire to identify the trademarks of a classic Capability Brown landscape and finds out how these gardens became the height of fashion for the ruling classes, and how Brown turned himself into a brand. Helen also visits Brown's grave in the village of Fenstanton and finds out how they're marking his life through music and literature. 

Producer: Toby Field. Published on July 28, 2016.

Capability Brown at 300

Helen Mark travels to the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire to encounter some of the wild boar who have made a home there in the last ten years. 

The Forest clearly suits them because their numbers are growing exponentially, with over 1500 feral animals at the last count. The population can almost triple in a year, and with no cold winters or culture of boar-hunting in the UK, the wild boar here have nothing to fear, except the Forestry Commission's marksmen. Adult males can reach twenty stone, run at thirty miles an hour, and can jump or barge through all but the strongest of fences. Also they are not afraid of humans, so unlike deer, you can't just shoo them out of your garden. 

Helen meets Dr John Dutton of the University of Worcester, who has made a study of human/boar social interaction in the Forest of Dean, and Kevin Stannard and Ian Harvey from the Forestry Commission, who have been landed with the task of managing numbers on their land. 

Then there's Simon Gaskell of the Real Boar Company, who farms boar and sells it as charcuterie. He knows exactly what they're capable of. He describes one of his boar, a beast called Julian, as 'the great white shark' of the woodland. Julian would appear out of nowhere and charge for no apparent reason. But they're not all so bad-tempered, even though they are classed as a 'dangerous wild animal' for farming purposes.

Along unfenced verges, in gardens and on common land, Helen finds evidence of the boar everywhere. And if you're out for a stroll in the heart of the Forest, it's hard not to imagine them watching you from the cover of the undergrowth.

Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery. Published on November 3, 2016.

Wild Boar in the Forest of Dean

Helen Mark follows Snowdonia Marathon and meets some of the people tackling this challenging course. Starting and finishing in Llanberis, the race encircles Wales' highest mountain of Snowdon, and rises to over a thousand feet in places. 

Andy John, Bishop of Bangor is taking on the Marathon for the third time, and he describes the sensation from running the course as being lost in the landscape but found in yourself. But he's dreading the twenty-two mile mark when he'll reach the 1200ft climb at Bwlch y Groes or "gap of the cross", before descending back into Llanberis for the finish.

Helen stops at the ten-mile mark to meet Arwyn Owen at Hafod y Llan farm to find out how Hydro-Electric Power is the new cash crop in this rugged environment. She also meets Phil Owen at Llechwedd Caverns to discover how the area became the slate-mining capital of the world. Both Phil's Father and Grandfather worked in the mine, but Phil became a musician and serenades Helen on his ukulele, three hundred feet below the surface.

Helen hands out water and energy gels with volunteers from the Snowdonia Society at the halfway point in Beddgelert and speaks to Margaret Thomas about Esme Kirby, the remarkable woman who set-up the organisation, before returning to Llanberis to greet a weary Andy John as he's crosses the finishing line. Published on November 10, 2016.

Snowdonia Marathon

David Lindo is the Urban Birder. He loves the birds he finds in parks and open spaces in the city but for this weeks Open Country he sets sail for the open spaces and cliffs of the Isle of Man, a landscape he has always wanted to visit. Stuck out in the middle of the Irish Sea The Isle of Man is a birders paradise with rare sightings of elusive birds such as choughs, hen harriers and falcons. David crosses the Sound to visit the Bird Observatory on the Calf of Man where the Manx Shearwater is making a comeback and hears about how to keep the sea god Manannan happy. Published on November 17, 2016.

David Lindo on the Isle of Man

Countryside magazine featuring people, walks and wildlife from rural Britain. ‘Open Country’ travels to a different corner of the British Isles every week, seeking out the wildlife, the landscapes and the controversies that excite the passions of local people.

Coast And Country

Popular tracks