Dame Judi Dench involved in awards presentation at Cambridgeshire event

The Countryside Restoration Trust, a charity which promotes wildlife-friendly farming, staged the 2018 National Hedgelaying Championship at Lark Rise Farm in Barton.

The trust, along with the National Hedge Laying Society (NHLS), held the 40th annual championship on Saturday (October 27).

TV personality Robin Page, who formerly hosted One Man and His Dog, was present, as was Dame Judi Dench, the trust’s silver jubilee patron.

Dr Vince Lea, wildlife monitoring officer at CRT, said: “It was fantastic, we had nearly 100 competitors on site doing about nine metres each, so that was nearly 900 metres of hedge cut down by hand.”

Despite the presence of competitors from all over the UK, it was a Cambridgeshire man who won.

“It was a local chap called Tim Radford,” said Vince, who added: “Robin Page is the chairman of the CRT and Dame Judi Dench came down to help with the award ceremony at the end.”

countrysiderestorationtrust.com