The Hedgerow.
Two hundred metres of mixed hedge on the north boundary, filmed continuously, for years. Almost nothing occurs. It is, reliably, the third most-watched camera here.
- Angle
- Fixed · 35 mm
- Live
- All year · Nothing happens
- Uptime, 90 days
- 99.7%
What it is actually pointed at.
We put it up as a joke and it has outlived the joke. A hedge changes so slowly that watching it for a minute is watching a photograph, and watching it across a year is watching the only honest calendar the farm has.
It is also the most valuable ground per acre on this farm, which is the part people do not expect. Hedgerow and margin earn agri-environment income that arrives whether or not it rains, and on a holding that lost five thousand pounds to a dry spring, an income that ignores the weather is worth more than a good crop.
Blackberries come out of this hedge and go into jam at £4.80 a jar. The only input is scratched forearms.
Worth watching when.
| When | What you get |
|---|---|
| Any morning in May | Hawthorn out. The one week of the year the hedge is showing off. |
| August and September | Blackberries, and whoever is picking them. |
| Winter, after a frost | The structure. You can see how it was laid, which is Gerald’s work. |
| Any other moment | A hedge. Doing nothing. That is not a fault report. |
Across the year, on this camera.
Bare, laid where it needed laying, and full of birds.
Green in a fortnight, then blossom, then nothing again.
Blackberries, and the jam that comes out of them.
Colour, then leaf fall, then structure.
The rig on this one.
The Hedgerow
- Mount
- Fence post at the field corner, 2.7 m
- Lens
- Fixed, 35 mm equivalent
- Stream
- 1080p at 25 fps, 1.8 Mbps
- Subject
- About 200 m of mixed hedge
- Night
- Infrared, and considerably more wildlife than daylight suggests
- Uptime, 90 days
- 99.7%
Uptime is the rolling ninety-day figure. When the stream is not available this page shows the last good frame instead: A stamped still of the hedge, which is nearly indistinguishable from the live feed. That is the joke.
The four things every camera here promises.
Fixed
No pan, tilt or zoom for anybody outside the farm office.
Silent
No audio on this camera or any other.
Pointed at us
No footpath, no neighbour’s land, no public highway in frame.
Fallback
A stamped still of the hedge, which is nearly indistinguishable from the live feed. That is the joke.
The other cameras.
Nine others, all fixed, all silent, all pointed at this farm.
What is worth watching this month.
A table of the whole year, camera by camera, so you are not opening ten tabs to find the one with something in it.
