Elliotts Looker Report

Today was my day for visiting all of the sites and checking all of the animals and remedying any problems.

Arriving at CC by the entrance next to the Pavilion onto Sunny Hill Road I checked out the snapped straining post next to the gate. Whilst this is stock proof we will be asking the MoD to send a team out to completely re-build this section as it is not an easy quick fix so hopefully this will be repaired fully soon.

I then drove around to all of the kissing gates and known problem areas and am happy to say there were no cuts and only one missing grazing sign. I had our new Assistant Keith Blackmore with me showing him around the sites so Keith will be checking next week so look forward to his blog entry. Keith is also now aware of where the interpretation panels are to be replaced so he will be getting on with this is due course.

I am pleased to say that Keith and I managed a positive count of every cow as they walked, not so quietly, up Long Bottom towards the Horse Pond. We saw 'collar' with her weeping eye and I have since asked to grazier to have another look at it. It was lovely to see all of the cows just milling, eating, chewing the cudd, laying up, walking, scratching, grazing, snapping branches all together and generally just being an absolutely brilliant herd of animals. Having not been to the site myself for a couple of weeks you can really see the difference that the cows have made this year and the site is feeling more and more like parts of the New Forest each time i visit - its great!

I took a couple of photos as it was such good weather. I hope you like them

Elliott