Maize maze a hit down on the farm

Date: 10 Aug 2006
Source: Martin Cassidy
BBC Northern Ireland rural affairs correspondent

The tassels of the tall green maize plants rustle gently in the breeze sweeping down from the nearby Mourne mountains.

It's an idyllic spot in rolling countryside near the busy holiday resort of Newcastle.

Combining farming and tourism seemed a good idea to Alan Blakely and when on holiday in England he saw something which he realized could attract visitors to his farm back in County Down.

This spring Alan planted his maize crop as usual to produce fodder for his cows.

But this would be a maize field with a difference.

Once the maize seedlings were established, a painstaking process began to fashion a maze through the growing crop.

Thanks to a designer and satellite technology, Alan began pulling out maize seedlings and what emerged was a winding two mile pathway in the shape of a dinosaur.

"The maze is planned by a company over in England and they sent it to a satellite GPS man in Lisburn and he came and marked out all the satellite points in our field," Alan said.

When the intricate matrix of seedlings had been removed, the next task was to rake and roll the pathways which had been created.

All Alan had to do then was wait for the maize to grow and for the visitors to arrive.

And arrive they did, in their hundreds.

So busy has the maize maze become that Alan now has members of his family employed guiding people around and rescuing the groups which inevitably get lost.

Each group is given a flag which they can use to attract help.

But most people manage to navigate the miles of paths through the seven foot high crop, using clues to follow a dinosaur trail through the lush vegetation.

Two American visitors have reached the wooden bridge which has been constructed in the middle of the maze.

"It starts off easy, then it gets difficult," one of the holidaymakers said.

Down at the starting point another group prepares to head into the maze.

Karen Blakely issues the flags and booklets with clues.

"We have had a baby as young as six days old being wheeled around to people over 90 years of age who still like the sense of adventure. It's mostly families," she explains.

Like many tourist attractions the new maze business is very much dependent on the weather, but then as farmers the Blakelys are used to that.

What they hadn't expected was just how popular their maze would be.

Averaging more than 100 visitors a day, this maize is producing a golden crop.