Three years after declaring the Purbeck Heaths as England’s first ever 'Super' National Nature Reserve (or 'Super' NNR), we are taking next steps in making this important area for UK wildlife even more nature-rich by creating an open grazing ‘savannah’.
The new ‘savannah’ will span about half of the 'Super' NNR, opening up a 1,370-hectare area where ponies, pigs, cattle and even deer can roam and graze freely and naturally shape an even more diverse and thriving landscape.
Grazing like their extinct ancestors would have done thousands of years ago, the nifty animals will help a wide range of wildlife such as sand lizards, southern damselflies, heath tiger beetles and many other species to prosper in this precious heathland landscape.
In March 2020, seven organisations - Natural England, RSPB, Forestry England, Rempstone Estate, Dorset Wildilfe Trust, Amphibian & Reptile Conservation and us – joined forces to ‘knit together’ 3,400 hectares of important habitats to help protect the area's delicate ecosystems, forming the Purbeck 'Super' NNR.
The Purbeck Heaths super reserve consists of a rich mosaic of lowland wet and dry heath, valley mires, acid grassland and woodland, along with coastal sand dunes, lakes and saltmarsh, making it one of the most biodiverse places in the UK. It is also home to thousands of species of wildlife, including all six native reptiles - adder, grass snake, slow worm, sand lizard, smooth snake and viviparous lizard.
The ponies, pigs and cattle are curious animals that explore the landscape, browsing and turning over the soil in many different ways and thereby creating new and improved habitats for a variety of different species, much like their ancestors have done in the past.
Ponies nibble tightly down to the ground, creating grassland lawns full of specialist flowers such as storksbill and waxcap fungi.
We can’t bring back aurochs, the native ancestors of our domestic cattle, but we can use our 200 Red Devon cattle to graze and behave in equivalent ways. Similarly, Exmoor ponies mimic the actions of now-extinct tarpan horses, and the quirky, curly coated Mangalitsa pigs are rooting around like wild boars.
Since its declaration in 2020...
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