I COULDN’T help a wry smile on my face when I read our local farmers referred to as ‘custodians of the countryside’. This correspondent must live in a different world to me. When I take a drive in the country what do I see? Hedges, bushes, etc, minced to within an inch of their lives by some monstrous hydraulic Flymo. Whatever happened to hedge laying?.

Grass verges and green areas, chewed to bits by 500hp tractors, hedges and gateways ripped out to facilitate these monsters and the associated equipment. I see streams and ponds choked with weed due to over-use of fertilizers and the run-off of nitrates from fields.

I see ancient meadows, plants and flowers poisoned by glyphosate weedkillers, all so the custodians can obtain the last penny of profit from every square metre. I can’t remember the last time I heard a skylark, peewit or curlew or saw a bumblebee – all poisoned with insecticides along with honey-bees which apparently, without help from abroad, will never recover.

‘Custodians of the countryside’ – don’t make me laugh. It’s enough to make you choke on your organic honey, from New Zealand, of course.

BOB SODEN, Nobles Close, Grove