Visiting Hidcote with your dog

Our pawprint rating system

We’ve been working on making it easier for you to find out how dog-friendly your visit will be before you and your four-legged friend arrive. To help with this, we've created a new pawprint rating system and given all the places in our care a rating. You can find this information in the National Trust members’ handbook.

Hidcote is rated assistance dogs only.

This means, unless your dog helps to facilitate your visit, please leave them at home or in another safe place during your visit.

Where can my dog go at Hidcote?

Only assistance dogs are allowed to access the property and garden at Hidcote. Assistance and support dogs are welcome in all areas. Please help by making sure they're wearing their hi-vis harness at all times.

Local walks that follow public rights of way happen to cut through the Hidcote car park. As such, well-behaved dogs are welcome in the car park, the nearby picnic area as well as in the Plant Centre and Barn Café kiosk, which is open in the summer. At peak times of year the car park can be exceptionally busy and bad weather can limit the number of spaces we have available for visitors to the garden, we recommend walkers and dog walkers wishing to use the car park at Hidcote between April and September do so outside of the hours 9:30 to 4:30pm.

What facilities are available for dogs?

A water bowl can be found near the Barn Café kiosk and Plant Centre - just let the team know if it needs topping up.

What do I need to be aware of?

There's a lot of livestock in the Hidcote area so please keep your dog on a short lead.

The Hidcote car park is often bathed in sunshine for most of the day so do not leave your dog unattended in your vehicle.

The Canine Code

We’ve worked with our partner Forthglade to come up with this Canine Code, which helps to make sure everyone can enjoy their day:

• Keep them close: using a short lead helps to keep your dog from disturbing ground-nesting birds and farm animals. It's essential to use a short lead around sheep. But if cattle approach you, it's best to let your dog off the lead, and call them back when it's safe to do so.
• Pick up the poo: please always clear up after your dog. If you can't find a bin nearby, take the poo bags home with you.
• Watch the signs: keep an eye on local signs and notices wherever you're walking. They'll tell you if a beach has a dog ban, for instance, or if a path has been diverted, or if you're in an area where dogs can run off-lead.
• Stay on the ball: remember that not everyone loves dogs, and some people fear them. So make sure your dog doesn't run up to other people, especially children.

Keeping control of your dog

Our definition of close or effective control is: ​

• Being able to recall your dogs in any situation at the first call
• Being able to clearly see your dog at all times (not just knowing they have gone into the undergrowth or over the crest of the hill). In practice, this means keeping them on a footpath if the surrounding vegetation is too dense for your dog to be visible
• Not allowing them to approach other visitors without their consent
• Having a lead with you to use if you encounter livestock or wildlife, or if you are asked to use one