A LITERARY study of animal and plant life in a Herefordshire meadow is reaping plaudits from reviewers and is in line to win the BBC Countryfile Country Book of the Year award.

Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field is the work of Longtown author and historian John Lewis-Stempel.

The book is already a Sunday Times Top 30 Hardback Non-Fiction bestseller.

It charts the animal and plant life in a traditional meadow on his 40-acre farm over the course of a year, and records the passage of the seasons, from cowslips in spring to summer hay-cutting and grazing in autumn.

Along the way it includes the biographies of animals inhabiting the grass and the soil, such as the badger clan, the fox family, the rabbit warren, the skylark brood and the curlew pair.

The book is such a hit The Guardian, Daily Mail, and The Times' Higher Educational Supplement all selected Meadowland among their Books of the Year.

His previous books on nature include Foraging, The Essential Guide to Free Wild Food and The Wild Life: A Year of Living on Wild Food, which details 12 months he spent turning his back on modern food, and eating whatever he shot, caught or foraged on his land.

The challenge almost cost Mr Lewis-Stempel his life, as the farmer lost weight and narrowly survived eating a poisonous mushroom.

But it also brought a new-found respect for nature – and saved him thousands of pounds saved on grocery bills.

“My wild food year was heaven and hell,” he said shortly afterwards.

“The hellish part was getting my hands scratched and cut after picking rose hips.

“I almost removed myself from the gene pool by eating a poisonous mushroom.

“I woke up with someone applying a defibrillator to my chest, I couldn’t move, and for six hours everything in the room went purple.

“But when it was heaven it was very good indeed.

“I was much healthier than usual and the wildlife I was catching was excellent.”

Another lesson he learned was that nature is “completely whimsical” and if you’re male you have to give up being a control freak.

n To vote for Meadowland,visit countryfile.com/awards2014-15.