Wark sits at 330m (1,000ft) at the upper end of a wide valley with an east west orientation. It generally faces south and west and looks across to Pressendye Hill and in the distance to the Deeside hills and Cairngorms to the south and west.

The landscape is open and somewhat bare with an even and rounded topography with gradual variations in contour. There is little tree cover, the estate landscape influences of the former Craigievar Estate to the east stopping short of the farm. To the north and the west are large blocks of even aged coniferous forestry (dominated by Sitka spruce and European larch).

The farm marks the valley head, with a minor watershed in the centre of the farm creating a relatively large flat area, which would have formerly been an area of wet heath, on peaty soils. The Rumblie Burn rises out of this area before heading on to join the Leochel Burn, a tributary of the River Don.

It is a wild landscape, especially in winter, with periods of prolonged snow cover.

In contrast in summer it can be a place of great peace, especially early in the morning, as the sun rises over the valley showing off one of our best assets - our skies. We do some fantastic skies on an impressive scale in a range of dispositions, from sunny to brooding and heavy. Feels like time to get poetic .

The name Wark could have a number of meanings and is linked elsewhere in the country to a fortified hilltop, or could be a variation of work. We fancifully like to think of it as a corruption of whaup, the southern Scottish word for a curlew and the bird that appears in our logo and adds greatly to the beauty of the farm in summer. Perhaps someone could enlighten us?

The open landscape is attractive to a range of species that chose short vegetation and long views for feeding and safety. Waders in particular are frequent visitors and we host six species at various times of year, along with a variety of waterfowl. Lapwing breed and winter on the farm in reasonable numbers and a central part of our conservation strategy is to produce improved conditions for breeding and feeding waders and the lapwing in particular. In support of this we are working with the Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group (FWAG) and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) on habitat management and creation measures. Overall our aim is to keep the centre of the valley open for the wading species while the valley sides is being managed for a range of farmland birds and mammals and the upper slopes and hilltop are again be kept open, to encourage skylarks.

We have created a 5.3ha (13 acre) wetland in the centre of the farm for the waders and waterfowl. Our cattle are used to manage the vegetation in this area to promote good conditions for nesting and feeding. On the valley sides we have a programme of hedge planting, arable field margin management and extensive grassland management to encourage grey partridge, yellowhammer and finches. In winter we have large flocks of chaffinch, linnet and greenfinch feeding over stubbles and in specially planted wild bird cover. One of the highlights of the farm bird life is the skylark chorus, which if one tunes into it on a May morning can really be described as deafening.

Rarer visitors have included grey shrike. Raptors present include buzzard, kestrel, sparrohawk, tawny owl and occasional peregrine falcons. Of the mammals we have a reasonable population of brown hare, which we are trying to increase, and occasional roe deer alongside the more common visitors.

Floristic diversity is more limited over the farm. We have recreated a small upland hay meadow habitat, based on sweet vernal grass and wild geraniums and have plans to introduce more semi-natural habitats.

Our aim is to achieve a greater diversity of species - we would love to have redshank in the wetland - but more so to continually increase the volume of wildlife present so that an abundance of life is evident.