Up With The Lark

Joan Bomford, BBC Countryfile's Farming Hero of 2015, has lived all her life in the lush rolling countryside of the Vale of Evesham, where cows graze the water meadows of the River Avon and modern life seems far away.

Farming is in Joan's blood. Generations of her family have worked the land, and in Up With The Lark, Joan tells us with warmth, wit and great insight what it's been like to live through an era of such enormous change.

Now aged 83, Farmer Joan is still as active; making hay, feeding the farm's beef cattle and running the riding school that she dreamed of as a child. A natural storyteller, Joan Bomford shares many heart-warming and magical events - like the elephant who came to stay, and the gentle tricks played on the evacuees who refused to eat her mother's rabbit stew. Yet her life has not been one long rural idyll - Joan watched helplessly as her cattle were swept away in a sudden flood and witnessed the night sky alight with the German bombing of Coventry - and latterly she's had to deal with family tragedy.

Up With The Lark is a portrait of a forgotten era and a celebration of the qualities that make Joan Bomford an inspiration to us all: her passion for the land, a love of family, and a determination to make the most of life.