'I haven't seen snow this bad in our dale for 12 years'

Claire Calvert and her family farm sheep in Swaledale

A fourth-generation sheep farmer in a remote Yorkshire dale has spoken about how her community deals with extreme winter weather.

Claire and Andrew Calvert and their two children live 1.5miles (2.4km) from the village of Keld in Swaledale, where they farm around 1,200 sheep.

In the last week they have seen temperatures of -12 and snow drifts of 2.5ft (76cm).

Claire says: "I don't think I've seen snow like this for a long time and I've been up here for about 12 years now.

"I used to live further down the dale and I don't think I've seen this much snow for at least 10 years.

"We have sheep on our moor and we have to go and feed them every day.

"When the snow is this deep the sheep can't really paw through or nudge the snow away with their noses to try to get the grass, the heather, the rushes below. We feed them twice or three times a day in this weather."

Andrew's father and brother also farm in the dale and together cover a "massive" area.

Swaledale had snow drifts of 2.5ft in some areas over the weekend

When preparing for winter, Claire says the family stock up with food and fuel.

She says: "I tend to fill my freezer with bread, make sure I've got enough tins in. The last time it actually snowed quite badly was a storm, but it was really windy so it ended up knocking our electric off for five days.

"So when this happens, we make sure that we have plenty in in case we have to start cooking off a gas stove or on the top of our log burner."

Claire and Andrew have a four-year-old and a six-year-old who rely on the bus to get to school – and in the last week the weather has caused some problems.

She says: "The school bus hasn't been able to get to some of the places but we always try and make it happen that we take them to the bus if we can get there."

Luckily, being farmers Claire and Andrew are very capable of digging themselves out and keeping safe, and she says many people in the village are well-prepared.

"Because people have been living there for quite a long time, I think people are prepared when it does come bad. It was forecast this time, so we did have the ability to get a bit in," she says.

Wainwath Falls near Keld was frozen and covered in snow

But during the Beast from the East in 2018, Claire was in the final stages of her first pregnancy - and despite feeling calm herself those around her were more concerned.

"We were still snowed in four days before my due date. I was okay, I wasn't particularly nervous but everyone around me kept messaging me saying: 'Will you try and get down to your mum and dad's further down the dale.'

"But I just thought I might as well sit where I'm happy, because if I move something might start to happen. We managed to get out on the Saturday and I went into hospital on the Sunday night.

"When snow comes we only have one safe route out of the dale. We can't use any other route so we have to make sure that one route is pretty free really."

This time around they've had some help from neighbouring farmers – one of whom brought a snow blower.

"We had a private gritter, a farmer from Arkengarthdale who came with his snow blower and blew the road out this year up over the top to Kirkby Stephen," she says.

It's a life that's hard to imagine if you live in a city, adds Claire.

"I have some friends who live only 50 miles away, I send them pictures of us here and they actually can't believe it."

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