FLAMBUOYANT television personality Clarissa Dickson-Wright spent two days with the Saltersgate Farmers' Hunt last week filming for her television series Clarissa and The Countryman.

Andrew Brown, joint master of the hunt which has hunted the forests at Dalby, Cropton and part of the North Yorkshire Moors since it was set up just before the Second World War, said the hunt was unique in Britain because it feeds its hounds on fish due to them being housed on a farm.

Dead fish from Ryedale fish farms is used to feed the hounds, he said.

"As we are not allowed to feed them fallen stock because they are kept on a farm, we instead collect fish which have died from natural causes or males which have been killed to enable their sperm to be taken."

Miss Dickson-Wright, who rose to fame in the cookery programme Two Fat Ladies in which she toured Britain on a motorcycle, rode with the hunt which, says Mr Brown, despite being called a farmers' hunt, now has a wide range of riding followers including a barber, a lorry driver, scientists, a doctor, and a policeman.

"She was very good fun to be with - very down to earth," said Mr Brown who is also the huntsman with the Saltersgate.

The programme goes out on March 15 on BBC2 at 7.30pm.

Updated: 09:51 Thursday, February 14, 2002