Rooted

An apology first: this newsletter is days late. It's been one of those months — a full house of B&B guests, haymaking, and then a heatwave that turned into something closer to a drought. Most of our energy went into keeping the livestock comfortable through the heat, which meant the laptop had to wait. We are grateful for the recent rain, helping to green up the aftermath of our hay cut.

But between the jobs I've had  time to think about why we do what we do, and "Rooted" feels like the right theme for this one.

When we first came to the Lint Mill, our plans were modest: grow some vegetables, find a field for my horse. We weren't thinking about regenerative farming, rare breeds, or soil biology — that all crept up on us. Somewhere along the way, rare breeds started to matter to us, farming in harmony with nature started to matter to us, and one thing led to another. Now that thinking sits behind most of what we do — through our organic certification, our work with the Nature Friendly Farming Network, the Clydesdale Soil Health Network, and the Rare Breeds Survival Trust.

It's on my mind again this week because last Thursday we had a visit from the Rural Payments as part of our application to restore more of our pasture to species-rich grassland under Scotland's Agri-Environment Climate Scheme. It's slow, careful work — the kind that doesn't show results for a year or two — but it's exactly the sort of rootedness we're after: giving the land back its own complexity rather than imposing ours on it.

That word — rooted — feels bigger than the farm, too. There's a lot of talk at the moment about place-based politics, not least with Andy Burnham's move into Number 10. For years, small farmers and small producers have been making the case that this is what will save us: not big centralised fixes, but people, land, and food genuinely rooted in a place. We've friends in Galloway who've set up a food hub between a handful of small producers, shortening the supply chain and putting more local food back into local hands. It's a small thing, but it's the kind of small thing that adds up and the kind of small thing we need to see more of.

We think it has to be the way forward, for the land and for us. We're facing an environmental crisis, and — less talked about — a health crisis too; by most measures, we're sicker than we've ever been. Paying attention to how we feed ourselves has to be part of the answer.

So everything here is rooted — in this place, in the Lint Mill, in what we believe. We're just trying to grow and rear the most nutritious food we can, and to keep our soil, our livestock, our land, and ourselves as healthy as we can manage along the way.

Thanks for your patience while we got this one written — normal service resumes next month.