Court Farm

A mixed agroecology and rewilding project across two 100-acre sites in Craswell

At Court Farm we are seeking to maximise environmental outcomes – which is more complicated than we thought it might be. We have not successfully defined what this means or found a way to measure our progress towards this goal.  We also want to increase the carbon captured by the land as well as slowing water flow.  Moving in a wilder direction is a consistent theme but we do intervene at times.  We feel that our efforts have been rewarded with more, and more diverse creatures and plants but we cannot prove it.

We came to Court Farm around 2014 and then in 2021 we took on further land – Proberts Farm - on the Black Hill.  Whilst both plots are becoming wilder our approach is different across the two.  Both are just under 100 acres each.

At Court Farm we continue to farm at a low level of intensity whilst at Proberts we will take an even more hands-off approach.

This translates, at Court Farm, into the elimination of chemical inputs and an aim to become an organic enterprise.  Choices around livestock are critical and we have made progress, over the last few years, towards reducing sheep and moving towards a conservation grazing approach employing rare breed, White Park Cattle.  We have stopped supplementary feeding of livestock and want to achieve "Pasture For Life" certification.  We want way more trees and have planted five thousand plus in multiple strips.  These are now 6 years old and doing well but we are concerned what impact our large squirrel population may have.  The farm has a number of meadows where reseeding has not eliminated all diversity and we have attempted to enhance sward diversity, working with the Herefordshire Meadows Group.

Proberts will be fenced this year and from 2022 the only livestock will be a few White Park Cattle to provide a catalyst for growth and diversity.  We are also considering further tree planting, the creation of scrapes / ponds and the use of pigs as a weapon against bracken.  Beyond this we aim to allow the site to become much wilder.

This project has been a shared family enterprise and has brought us closer to each other and to nature.  We have many exciting projects and plans on our very long list on which we look forward to working.  We have benefitted from the expertise of our farming neighbours (even where our approach is at odds with traditional farming practice) and this cooperation is essential to achieving our goals.  We look forward to collaborating with others in the Rewilding Network.