Areas where you can see their work for yourselves include:
The Roman temple – With the action of grazing and our team of volunteers clearing the feature by removing all the gorse this historic feature is once more clear to see on the ground. This temple is typical of the archaeological features that will progressively become more prominent as the ponies do their job. Without the grazing this would have been a constant job for our team.
The inner ramparts – Where the ponies move as a herd, they spread out in a wide group and so graze all up the sides of the ramparts rather than walking in a line on the exposed chalk. This is perfect for conservation. Their actions widen the paths and keep them clear so that our thousands of visitors don’t all walk on the same line, which can add to the erosion.
The outer ditches – At the moment our intrepid herd have not had much effect in the ditch bottoms but as winter approaches and the grass stops growing we expect their grazing will start to make inroads here too. Without their grazing down in these hard-to-reach places we would have to use specialist equipment and use up many of our volunteer hours working on the steep and uneven ground. These ponies simply take it all in their stride.