AUDIO: "WISH YOU WERE HERE" with Sylvia Byers

Between 2003 and 2009 Windrose’s predecessor, Trilith, ran Farm Radio. Funded largely by the European Union, this was an internet radio station aimed at family farms. Its fundamental aim was to help counter the isolation experienced by many people working smaller farms by keeping them in touch with other farmers and the wider world around them. A mass of features and news items were produced, many of them made by women from farming families who were trained as radio correspondents and worked alongside professionals.

Once established Farm Radio acquired an international dimension, with links to community broadcasters in Malawi and Australia. It’s collaboration with an Irish community station, West Limerick 102fm, went further still. Farm Radio and West Limerick exchanged both programmes and volunteers: two rural communities speaking to each other over the heads of urban society.

A series of features about life in our area was made for Farm Radio by James Harrison and broadcast in Ireland. These can now be heard again on Close Encounters.As well as farming playing its role in the rural economy, West Dorset is home to numerous small businesses working hard at earning a decent living.

In this edition...

The West of England is well known for clichés. Cream teas and cider, seaside holidays with donkeys on the beach and kiss-me-quick hats.

But peel away this synthetic layer and you’ll discover a rich and varied landscape full of surprises.

This was true for a former resident of Wiltshire, who, after coming to live amongst the brooding chalk hills around Beaminster in Dorset, was left wanting to find out more about her newfound surroundings.

And it seemed she had plenty of advice available right on her doorstep…

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