This month the Dorset Life team is asking whether planning is becoming less democratic, why almost 7,000 people are still waiting for social housing and, after a brutal summer of drought and falling yields, whether some Dorset farmers can actually afford to put another crop in the ground. There are brighter things too: we meet Keith Watts, still playing the Lydlinch church organ 73 years after he started, and the Carr family, whose son’s request for two Christmas pigs somehow became one of Britain’s biggest pedigree Saddleback herds. We’ve gone inside Stonehenge after hours, found Rowan Atkinson heading for Swanage, James May brewing beer in Blandford and a five-foot ceramic animal waiter serving fish-finger sandwiches made from actual fingers. Plus Dorset County Show, wildlife, farming, business, history, walks, letters, opinions and the usual glorious miscellany.
Love Dorset? Dive in (it’d be rude not to).
That opening summary captures why this issue works so well: it moves from the practical pressures facing Dorset—planning decisions, social housing and the cost of putting a crop in the ground—to the people and places that give the county its character. I especially like the contrast between the long-running church organ story, the Carr family’s Saddleback herd and the after-hours look at Stonehenge; it makes local reporting feel connected rather than compartmentalised.
The same balance should make the issue useful for readers planning days out. The county show, coastal walks, wildlife and local history all give readers reasons to look more closely at the landscape, while the letters and opinions keep the conversation grounded in community life.