THOUSANDS of traditional barns in the Yorkshire Dales are facing dereliction and the Country Land and Business Association has launched a campaign to help save them.

There are an estimated 6,000 barns in the Yorkshire Dales National Park - "one of the most characteristic and cultural features" of the area, says the CLA - but as many as two thirds of them could be at risk.

"Unfortunately, most barns are isolated and not at the roadside, thus limiting their potential," says the CLA's regional director, Dorothy Fairburn.

"Adequate grants must be made available to encourage landowners and farmers to maintain one of the key ingredients in a landscape on which the area's tourism industry depends.

	Ellergill Barn, Litondale

"The buildings are unsuitable for today's machinery and animal welfare requirements and so are not in use and become neglected."

The association is to campaign for greater Government grants to allow farmers to keep barns in good repair or to convert them to other uses, like Ellergill Barn in Littondale (see picture), which one awards when it was converted to make bunk accommodation for walkers.