Restoring Carmarthenshire’s Grasslands

The Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales is currently leading on a Carmarthenshire-based landscape-scale project to help restore the county’s grasslands, particularly its characteristic rhos pastures, for the benefit of wildlife.

The project, which is called the ‘Gwendraeth Grasslands project’, includes two of the Trust’s Carmarthenshire reserves – Ffrwd Farm Mire SSSI, near Pembrey, and Rhos Cefn Bryn, Llannon, as well as a number of privately owned sites, and two partners’ sites in the form of the National Botanic Garden of Wales’ meadows at Waun Las, and the Grassland Trust’s Carmel nature reserve.

The project aims to undertake work to enable long-term management essential to maintaining these grassland sites for the variety of important species that they support, such as the scarce marsh fritillary butterfly – a Carmarthenshire speciality. The project is paying for fencing, scrub clearance, the installation of water supplies and troughs, and some cutting of rough and rank vegetation, so that grazing can be re-introduced.

Grazing these conservation sites is key to their long-term protection, as it helps maintain the floral diversity of the habitat, and hence the range of invertebrates and many other species that depend on them. Grazing, particularly with cattle, helps reduce the amount of tussocky grasses like purple moorgrass, and scrub such as willow. Many of these sites have suffered from under-management for many years, simply because they have become uneconomic and impractical to graze.

The project is also introducing PONT’s innovative livestock leasing scheme. Cattle are the most effective grazing animals for these sites in wildlife terms, but owning and managing cattle for the first time can be expensive, and even intimidating. The livestock leasing scheme allows PONT to purchase the cattle and lease them to the landowner, who can later decide whether they want to take the animals on fully, or pass them back to PONT. It allows a ‘taster’ to encourage cattle grazing, and we hope that it will facilitate the return of cattle to these damp pastures, securing their long term future.

The project is an exciting opportunity for the Trust, both to take great steps forward on our own sites, but also to extend the benefits to working with many partners. With increasing pressures on our land, projects like this which enable us to engage with private landowners and help them work for wildlife are going to be of critical importance over the coming years.

The work is funded by WREN, a not for profit business that awards grants to community and conservation projects from funds donated by Waste Recycling Group (WRG) to the Landfill Communities Fund. The project has also benefitted from contributions from the Countryside Council for Wales and Environment Agency Wales. Other partners include PONT, Carmarthenshire County Council and Butterfly Conservation.

Carmarthenshire Biodiversity November/December 2011 eNewsletter