Innovation and inner peace at care farm

Farming can be a solitary life and the solitude is often claimed to be a primary reason for a high suicide rate. So there’s a certain irony in the fact that it’s this very isolation which some farmers are now turning into profit though a diversification called care farms.

Farmers are offering up the space and tranquillity of the countryside as a therapy for the disadvantaged, those with disabilities or as a release from the daily grind for people from all walks of life.

In Gareth Gaunt’s case the setting is nothing short of idyllic. He runs Carlshead Farms at Sicklinghall near Wetherby, where he has recently constructed a barn in his woodland as an outdoor classroom.

“We have adults with learning disabilities here three days a week, people with autism and some suffering from mental health problems,” says Gareth.

“The care farm we run is about offering a therapeutic environment for everyone.

“Phil Pemberton, a bushcraft expert who has worked with Ray Mears, helps the groups and they have now set up a little chicken enterprise selling eggs. We’re now looking to develop a whole series of things like that.

“Until last year we had a number of young people, primarily those in care who have had pretty rotten lives, and often involving abuse of some kind, coming here.

“We ran a very successful place of learning at a courtyard development on our land for the past seven years.”

Last year Gareth received funding from Natural England for the outdoor classroom in the woods which was built by a local craftsman, Adam Walker.

“We recognise there is a huge need to prevent problems we are seeing today, such as stress and depression,” says Gareth.

“When you are walking through bluebells in the woods and visiting our barn it is very quiet and secluded. You get chance to have time to yourself.”

Gareth spent five years as a horse vet all over the world and had no plans to come back to the 500-acre family farm. He returned when his father, Robin, needed a kidney transplant. “I hadn’t seen a place for me on the farm because of the economics, but I took a break from my veterinary career to look after the farm while my father had his operation.

“I saw opportunities to diversify temporarily in order to get the farm back on the rails. I was all set to go back to veterinary work after that.”

His first move was into willow for woodchip, his second was converting outbuildings into the Carlshead Business Centre.

A number of national awards for innovation have since come his way. He now grows 150 acres of willow, which he first planted in 1998 and has set up a not-for-profit co-operative for farmers growing renewable energy crops. He also grows wheat and barley through a share farming partnership.

“Roger Tempest of Broughton Hall gave me the inspiration for the business centre. We now have five companies here and once again it’s a quality of life issue.

“Why go into a busy town or city to work when you can work here and enjoy the rural location?”

One of the companies is Trish Nugent’s Holistic Wellbeing business. Trish now runs what she calls a “mind spa” using the barn in the woods. “Looking after your body from the inside, by focusing on your mind, is what I do,” she says.

“It’s about positive thinking. The oak wood barn is set in a beautiful location, somewhere you can be quiet and at ease with yourself and then start making informed decisions about the structure of your life.

“People are often so busy in their hyper-connected way of things that they just need to get away somewhere like this. That’s why Gareth and myself are working to get the barn used as a classroom and somewhere to meditate, and it appears to have taken off.”

Gareth wants to take his ideas further. He has a vision of fostering more young local talent. “Through diversifying I am finding more and more business opportunities. Students from Wetherby High School come here once a week to learn skills such as chainsaw handling.

“This has led me to think that we should be inclusive of other students from the school too. Why are we not catering for them? Why aren’t they writing my business plan?

“I want to run ‘pigs in the willows’ with rare breed pigs clearing out all the weeds in my willows and marketing them. I want the students to come up with marketing plans, produce brochures and figure out who the customer is.

“I want more hives on the farm to produce more honey, as a result of growing more wild flowers. I’d like to open a drop-in day centre in Wetherby as a bakery-café.”

He has plans for his woodlands too. “I’m looking at managing them for wood fuel. My idea is to work in partnership with Lower Dales Training and bring students into the wood fuel business.” It is going to be a real growth area.” A man who believes in the power of positive thinking.

Green thoughts in a green shade

Finding inner peace through nature is not a new idea.

In his book titled ‘Walden’ published in 1854, the American thinker Henry David Thoreau describes his two years living in a cabin in secluded woodland in Massachusetts.

He used it to promote the goals of personal introspection, simple living and self-sufficiency.

His ideas had an enormous impact on his generation and succeeding ones.