The environment and equine land owners

[Peggs]

I was recently reading the new countryside stewardship guidelines and it got me thinking whether equine land owners should also be aware of the effects of horses on the environment.

I have complete understanding of those who have very limited land on which to graze their horse/s, that providing untouched areas for nature is impracticable, I don't have much more than a postage stamp at home so every blade is precious! I am however very lucky to have extra grazing that I'm allowed to use by a kindly family. It's approximately 10 acres, divided into 2 large fields surrounded by a thick hedge line and 5 small post and rail paddocks.

One of the larger paddocks has a small stream running along one edge. Along this length I've left approximately 2m gap and electric fenced down the length. In practice, this is supposed to create a refuge for invertebrates and also prevents fertiliser, that is applied annually as it is also cut for hay, going into the water source. On the other side of the land is a large stream that is a tributary of a river that runs through the village. The family have also planted a small belt of decidious tress - whether it was for environmental reasons or because it looked nice, I don't know, but it is a small haven for wildlife with buzzards nesting in it over the summer and a well established badgers set.

What are people's opinions on larger equestrian set-ups, such as studs and livery yards, or people who just have too much grazing in making patches for wildlife? I don't believe it would ever be subsidised, so would be done off people own back.

Does anyone already do this, living in the very arable East Anglia, I'm very naive on practices within places like national parks. Do people know if guidelines have to be followed to protect land grazed by horses?

There are also issues such as where muck heaps are located, so not near a water course to prevent leaching and fertiliser spreading, do people follow codes of good practice if they don't get a company in to do it?

As an ever growing industry is there a case to be made that we should be more involved in helping the ever declining wildlife of our countryside?

(Apologies for my ever excessive waffling!)

 

[HashRouge]

I think it is a lovely idea and I wish more large landowners did it. I used to work on an SJ yard which was based on a 500 acre arable farm in Nottinghamshire. They were extremely dedicated to keeping as much land as possible in a natural state, to allow wildlife to thrive. This included wide, tree filled verges between their fields, several areas of untouched woodland and a tree planting project. It was an absolute haven for wild animals, birds and plant-life. I particularly used to love hacking through the woods in the summer, as they had some grass tracks going through them, as you would see so many plants and animals, it was a little patch of paradise. We even used to get yellowhammers, which are a red list endangered species. I actually feel privileged to have been able to live there for a year!

 

[Overread]

Does anyone already do this, living in the very arable East Anglia, I'm very naive on practices within places like national parks. Do people know if guidelines have to be followed to protect land grazed by horses?

RSPB has a few sites where they have semi-wild horses roaming for management. Konik ponies are all the rage within conservation along with a slew of native breeds of stock animals such as sheep or cattle. They are often used to manage sites where their grazing helps prevent dominant plants getting established and wiping out competition. Their poaching of the ground with their hooves further creates a varied landscape with the bare earth a key area for some species of plant and insect to move into.

They've also been used to help graze sites recently stripped of woodland and Minsmere is doing a fair bit of that in old pine plantation woodland which the forestry commission is loaning to the RSPB to manage. Trees are coming out; followed by spraying to remove bracken and then on some sites ponies to further graze and keep plants down.

The objective being to return areas of the land back to heathland - which in itself is generally considered to require poor quality soils (which is hard these days with so much fertilizer use).



In general you can do a lot just by cutting back on fertilizer and shifting toward a meadow system of old. The end of WW2 saw us either plough up or improve meadows into grasslands with many modern grasslands being monoculture or at least very limited in the range of species.




Of course there's a flipside too and there is, interestingly, growing views that some grazing schemes should stop to allow more rewilding back toward woodland instead of extensive grassland only (mostly that is focused on the big sheep areas such as Wales and Scotland - especially when one considers that many of those sheep farms are only viable with subsidies).




Anyway that's a lot of long rambling to say possibly contact the RSPB for an information pack. That said the NFU might also be a good port of call and might have more ready information for those keeping stock such as horses. I would also hope that the various horse organisations would have further input on hand; although i can't suggest names as I've got no idea what groups there are.


One other big though is to network locally with your neighbours and other local groups (your local natural Trust group would be an ideal port of call for that). Many times conservation requires different groups to join together. Alone you might not be able to provide much, but if you design your conservation on your site to network and link up with those on your boundaries suddenly you can achieve a lot more. "Green corridors" are a major focus at present and rely heavily on the idea of linking up different areas of the natural world that we do have. It allows migration to flow between areas, which means species can migrate if one area proves inhospitable; or to expand their population distribution; and it means that a spread and mobile population can more easily weather losing a local group here and there.
Whereas if they are more isolated its much easier to lose groups of them and not be able to repopulate those areas or other zones to counter.


Conservation is a very interesting area, but one thing I have noticed is that there are a LOT of people in the countryside who would like to do more but have no idea of what to do nor really where to turn for the information (at an appropriate level). The result being that many get set in their ways for too long that trying to then conserve in a meaningful way often becomes a major challenge and investment to shift their patterns.

 

[Suechoccy]

The Barn Owl Trust are keen to find new locations to put their owl boxes. If you have trees or pylons, give them a call.

 

[Overread]

The Barn Owl Trust are keen to find new locations to put their owl boxes. If you have trees or pylons, give them a call.

That's a good call; there are only supposed to be somewhere in the region of 500 pairs of barnowls in the UK and East Anglia (certainly Suffolk) is a prime hotspot (heck where I am we've had barn owls for 30 years so it was rather a shock to find out that they are so critically endangered when I see one most months). If you've sites for them to nest they'd certainly be interested and it would be worth contacting them.

 

[Suechoccy]

I've got 2 barn owl boxes (one is mine, one is the Trust's). Both have nesting stock doves in them, and lately there's been a roosting common buzzard in the tree containing one box too, though it hasn't put the doves off who are currently sitting on eggs. perhaps he's hoping to grab a newly hatched dove chick for brekkie one morning?

 

[Mooseontheloose]

There used to be a lot of financial help for farmers to keep wetlands wet, provide natural habitat etc but these stewardship schemes have come to an end in some areas. Also the Higher Level Schemes are limited, we applied as we are keen to keep our water meadows, orchids/owls/water voles/varied flora as natural as possible and were turned down. We used to be helped to do this, as it was quite expensive - loss of grazing, not able to use the land during nesting and flowering periods, or as it was returned wetland obviously when it was very wet. These schemes have finished now. We'll obviously go on, as we love it, but it does cost!
Our horses love the 'weeds' and flowers, (ragwort is a nightmare as we have to pull everything by hand as can't spray) and I feel sorry for horses kept on very mono-species grass, they must miss the chance to self medicate. Our horses particularly like the alder tree leaves, and make for them at times. Must provide something they want.

 

[twiggy2]

where I keep my horse there is lots of land and a big tree plantation that have been left to return to a wild state, they were paid for the tree plantaion going in and I believe the get a yearly cheque for a certain amount of years as long as they don't cut it down. the fields have never been fetilised and were sprayed for ragwort for the first time ever last year. It is like this through laziness but it does mean the wildlife is very diverse.
I believe sprays and fertiliser are teribble things and still cannot get my head round the fact that we use chemicals that are known to cause serious health issues (for goodness sake they have to wear protective clothing and masks to handle and spray them) and spray them onto food crops for both humans and animals.
The things the yard do that they should not is allow all rubbish on the muck trailers and then burn it and there are many many water leaks.