Innovative methods are restoring native habitats

Frankie Woodgate and her heavy working horses Yser and Tobias returned to Hastings Country Park last week.

The traditional method of landscape management involves working horses pulling heavy rollers to ‘bruise’ the bracken. Bruising bracken with horse drawn rollers is an effective, low impact method of reducing the vigour and growth of bracken in hard-to-reach areas and avoids the use of chemicals.

IMG_1517
Frankie with on of the horses ‘bruising’ the bracken in the country park.

Lead councillor for the environment, Colin Fitzgerald said, “Last year, Hastings Country Park won an innovations award for establishing a free roaming conservation grazing project, and using heavy horses to reduce the bracken is just another way of managing threatened habitats on public land, which successfully combines biodiversity and wildlife management with public enjoyment and getting closer to nature, especially for residents from disadvantaged communities in the town.”

By reducing the amount of bracken in Hastings Country Park nature reserve Hastings Borough Council is restoring native coastal grassland habitats.

Related

Sussex charities invited to free workshop on building corporate partnerships

Ansvar Insurance is hosting a free workshop on Building Corporate Partnerships on Thursday June 26th, the event is open to all charities and will be held at Ansvar’s Community Hub in Brighton, with the option for organisations outside the area to join remotely via Microsoft Teams. The session will be led by Andy King, an […]

Inspired by a walk in Alexandra Park

Do we need to earn ourselves the world we think we deserve? Maybe we are all suffering from a bit of entitlement syndrome? I was out for an early dog walk this morning, down through our local park – it was beautiful. It’s called Alexandra Park and it has won awards. There are fine well […]