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At about this time of year (UK) I cringe to see farmers out grass rolling just at the time the ground nesting birds are sitting on their eggs with many just about to hatch. Just in case anyone is unaware of this practice it involves towing a 12 foot steel roller weighing several tons behind a tractor & totally flattening all the grass in the field. I understand it has been found that the grass soon recovers and re grows much thicker therefore resulting in a much heavier crop of silage in a few weeks time.

I am aware of a field near me with 3 lapwing nests in it containing 2, 3 and 4 eggs. The farmer has rolled many of his other fields but has not yet got round to rolling the one with these nests in. I have placed twigs near the nests to draw his attention to them but this could also attract the attention of egg collectors. The root problem is grass rolling, but "what can I do about it"?

I am unaware of how many nests have already been rolled on the hundreds of acres he has already rolled but I am sure it will run to scores. Multiply that by the number of farmers who practice grass rolling.

MINESAPINT

Don't know the legal side of it - but stuff like hedge pruning, heather burning etc should be done before the nesting season starts; so why does the same not apply to grass rolling?

Btw, it's done to press down the turf which often freezes over winter and lifts itself off its roots, so to speak. The pressing down means it connects up to its water and nutrient supply again... (Not very well explained, I fear!)

INA,

I have recently discussed the issue of hedgecutting with a local wildlife expert & he advised me it is legal any time of year but the hedge must be inspected for birds nests prior to cutting.

MINESAPINT

That's news to me! Well, then at least the farmer should inspect the ground for birds, too... Same as you are expected to check a pile of wood for hedgehogs before you set fire to it. Or a hay meadow for deer calves before cutting...

I doubt many folk do it. And if they do find a bird nesting in the hedge - what will they do? Chase it away before the start cutting?

From the RSPB website....

The lapwing is fully protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981; it an offence to kill, injure or take an adult lapwing, or to take, damage or destroy an active nest or its contents.

The only exception is legitimate farming practices that cannot be reasonably delayed, although farming methods can often be modified to reduce the impact on the lapwings.

Does the rolling fall into the latter category? Have you tried speaking to him about it?

Clara x

Thanks, Clara. That's the problem with the rolling: it has to be done at a certain time... After the last ground frosts, and before the grass starts trying to grow! So you'd really have to find the nests, and try and work around them.

If you have concerns then talk to the farmer.

I have to say I do feel for the farmers sometimes, I bet they would just like to get on with their job of farming!!

Hopefully this can be resolved for all concerned.

Replies are tending to refer to "the farmer" and yes I do live on a farm of about 300 acres on which "the farmer" practices grass rolling.

However if I was able to change things by negotiation on this farm it does not help the ground nesting birds on the thousands of other farms where this practice is popular. What is needed is a more universal approach to try to minimise the damage nationwide. I have occasionally seen farmers on TV who understand their very special responsibilities notably one in Norfolk who help wildlife by leaving sugarbeet tops on the fields over winter for birds to feed on, inspecting fields for nests prior to working in them & staking the positions of any nests located for future reference. Other farmers are not so responsible. I even know of an occasion when a farmers wife attended a meeting to discuss how they could farm in a way that is more sympathetic to wildlife and said she had been advised Lapwings like to nest in damp/boggy areas which are not that much use for agricultural purposes anyway. I was therefore surprised within a day or two her husband rolled what I would have thought to be just such an area behind our house.

Living in a farming community I do notice all sorts of what I consider to be unacceptable practices like bulldozing an old barbed wire fence into a wood in order to put a new fence in its place. That old barbed wire fence will be there damaging wildlife (roe deer probably) until it rusts away, probably 50 years.

Ina, I note you say rolling should take place before the grass starts to grow. In some fields it is nearly up to the top of my wellies. I also note that winter cereal crops are not rolled and they seem to grow on OK after the winter.

MINESAPINT

Just to address another couple of issues raised. I was recently advised hedgecutting was legal anytime as long as the hedge was inspected prior to cutting. I cannot confirm definitively that this is true or not.

Additionally when we talk about what we consider acceptable/unacceptable this is a different question to whether it is a legal/illegal practise.

Personally I find it unacceptable to set traps on moorland designed to trap magpies and crows but apparently it is legal and if I chose to free these trapped birds before the gamekeeper came along to shoot them it would be me acting unlawfully.

MINESAPINT

Just a quick note as to why farmers do roll the grassland (or at least why they do round here)
Frost heaving and any ploughing (if the grassland has been sown as part of a rotation) would have brought any heavy objects such as stones and old bits of farm machinery (plough shares/harrow teeth etc) up to the surface. If they're still there later in the year when the cut the grass for silage they go through the chopper which has a high speed rotating drum with explosive results (I've actually seen the back of the cutter drum made at of 6 mm thick steel blown out like it was tissue paper )
By rolling the grass now when the soil is still soft you press such objects below the surface and save a lot of grief later in the year.

I have to doubt that. As a metal detectorist (one of the responsible ones) I can tell you with absolute certainty that those objects tend not to lie on the surface. Any farmer who has a problem with lenticular freezing would have my sympathy, but that kind of thing only rarely happens at a depth of a couple of inches. It's more likely to be at the topsoil/subsoil boundary and so wouldn't make a ha'porth of difference to grass growth - unless you happen to have only a couple of inches of topsoil.

Rolling is, I feel, an activity which farmers have become convinced is necessary when, in fact, it's more likely to be a waste of their time.

Well where I live in Brittany (and the other part of France I lived in), farmers remove the large stones/rocks WHILST they are ploughing.

I have never seen or even heard of grass rolling!

And it's not like they give a damn about wildlife because they spend all winter trying to kill them! Not that they are necessarily very good at it because they're usually drunk, the 'official' hunts make such a racket with all the shouting, barking, and parping horns that the wildlife just run away long before the hunters get anywhere near. The best thing is the reports you read where the hunters shoot each other, which is quite a common occurence! YAY!

MKG wrote:I have to doubt that. As a metal detectorist (one of the responsible ones) I can tell you with absolute certainty that those objects tend not to lie on the surface. Any farmer who has a problem with lenticular freezing would have my sympathy, but that kind of thing only rarely happens at a depth of a couple of inches. It's more likely to be at the topsoil/subsoil boundary and so wouldn't make a ha'porth of difference to grass growth - unless you happen to have only a couple of inches of topsoil.

Rolling is, I feel, an activity which farmers have become convinced is necessary when, in fact, it's more likely to be a waste of their time.

What you say may be true if you're talking about permenent pasture, but if the grass is from an undersown crop from a ploughed field i can assure you you find all sorts of crap on the surface, hence field walking is a quick and easy way of sampling a field.

There have been a number of reasons suggested in this thread for grass rolling and all seem pretty plausible. I have spoken to the local farmer this morning and he advises me the main reason he does it is so he minimises the soil among his silage caused by the mole hills. He rolled the field some time ago that has the Lapwings nests in so they are safe until he cuts the silage by which time they will have hatched.

MINESAPINT

I would agree with the farmer regarding the need to roll grass - non permanent pasture that is. It is purely to flatten the molehills and stones or other debris that has been lifted with the winter frosts. As the grass is a crop, the cutter is set low so as to make the best use of the growing crop.

Cereal crops are not rolled as the straw is generally regarded as a waste product. Indeed up here it was burned regularly before the practice was rightly outlawed. When cereal crops are cut, the cutter bar on the combine is set pretty high - remember the straw is the waste product and this actually benefits the soil when the longer stubble is ploughed back in.

By me, it is very common for farmers to have wide strips on the field margins left to nature. The farmer in the village actually sows some of these areas with sunflowers and phacelia although I suspect this is for partridges and pheasants and not for wildlife per se.