Farmers across the North will recognise this set-up. In a new Forestry Commission case study published on 28 November 2025, Hilley Farm in Shropshire shows how to turn awkward, unproductive ground into useful trees without giving up good grazing.

The farm has created a four-hectare woodland by planting small pockets and edges that never paid their way. Those new copses and agroforestry strips now give the cattle shade, shelter and calmer handling, while lifting biodiversity across the holding.

Crucially, the productive fields stay in rotation. The planting has gone into corners where machinery struggles, damp patches and exposed edges-spots every upland and lowland beef and dairy unit knows only too well. It’s tidy, practical and repeatable.

Registering the project under the Woodland Carbon Code adds rigour. It’s the UK’s quality standard for woodland carbon projects and can open a modest income stream alongside the environmental wins.

Northern England is moving the same way at scale. The Woodland Trust’s Northern Forest aims to plant at least 50 million trees from Liverpool to Hull, in a region where tree cover sits at about 7.6%, below the UK average.

More than 10 million trees have already been established across the North since 2018, with 2024/25 the biggest season so far-much of it on farms through hedges, shelterbelts and new woods.

For northern livestock businesses, the takeaways are clear: start with the problem spots, design shade and shelter for stock first, and line up planting so kit still moves easily at silage and winter feed time. That’s exactly what Hilley Farm has done.

The Forestry Commission’s short film with Mandy Stoker Jones makes the point plainly: trees can work around the farm, not instead of the farm. It’s worth a watch before you put pen to paper on your own plan.

As the case study puts it, Hilley Farm’s woodland "will provide a legacy for future generations to enjoy"-the sort of long view that sits well across the North.