Puttenham Common Habitat Restoration

Welcome to Puttenham Common

Puttenham Common is 180 hectares of priority habitats – a mosaic of lowland heathland, dry acid grassland, purple moor grass and rush pasture, fen, bogs, mires, lowland mixed deciduous woodland and wood pasture. Puttenham Common is owned and managed by Hampton Estate. In 1968 the Estate opened the common to the public for everyone’s enjoyment. The footpaths and the five car parks are managed by Surrey County Council.

A nationally  important space for nature

Puttenham Common’s mosaic of rare habitats makes it a very important nature hot spot. Over the last 200 years in the UK we have lost 84% of our lowland heathland and it remains one of the UK’s most threatened habitats. It is now globally rarer than rainforest! Lots of rare wildlife species depend on our lowland heathland and the other habitats that occur as part of a heathland mosaic – Nightjars, Woodlarks, Nightingales, Silver Studded Blue and Small Heath butterflies, Sand lizards, Serotine Bats, Smooth Cat’s-ear, Shepherd’s Cress, Bog Pimpernel and Bottle Sedge as well as other amazing animals, insects and plants!

Creating a 100 year vision

With the support of ecological consultants EPR, and in consultation with Natural England, the Environment Agency and the Forestry Commission we have developed a 100 year vision for Puttenham Common:

‘To create a restored, biologically diverse heathland landscape with low-level rotational extensive grazing of a herd of traditional beef cattle, biologically-rich restored wetlands (with the aim of reducing wildfires across the Common), thriving heathland species, sustainably managed public access, an active volunteer group and nature-based community’.

An important location

Puttenham Common includes parts of Puttenham and Crooksbury Commons SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest) and Lower Puttenham Common and Halesmoor Wood SNCI (Site of Nature Conservation Importance). The site is also home to the remains of Hillbury Hillfort  a Scheduled Monument which we manage in partnership with Historic England. The area is within a B-Line and The North Downs Way long distance trail passes through. Puttenham Common provides access to nature for a large population, with approximately 2 million people living within a 10km radius of the site.

What is happening at Puttenham Common?

The abandonment of grazing on Puttenham Common since the 1940s has turned the area from a largely open landscape of heathland, grassland and wetlands into a primarily wooded site. Trees and scrub have grown up where there once was open heathland, acid grassland, wetland, bog, and mire habitats. These heathland habitats on the common would have existed ‘since time immemorial’ created through prehistoric forest clearances and then maintained through the ancient exercise of commoner’s rights to graze animals, cut peat, and take firewood.

Puttenham Common’s unique geology, soil, hydrology and cultural history mean that these open heathland habitats were once home to rare species such as Heath Dog Violet, Marsh Clubmoss and Bog Orchid (Puttenham Common is the first place that Bog Orchid was ever recorded in Surrey, in 1847 by Mr J.D Salmon). Our records show that 150 years ago, Puttenham Common was a much more open mosaic of wet and dry habitats that contained many more rare and important species than it does today.

Therefore, we are embarking upon an exciting plan to restore these vital open habitats and reverse this species loss. We are doing this by:

1. Targeted tree and scrub removal – we will remove encroaching young pioneer trees and scrub in certain places to create new areas of wood pasture and to restore areas of wet and dry heathland, valley mire and bogs. We will continue to manage the precious wet Alder carr woodlands and mature oak trees to ensure these woodland habitats thrive. It’s all about the right tree in the right place on Puttenham Common. At the heart of the vision for wood pasture is the preservation of veteran trees (particularly oak) and this entails ensuring the recruitment of some new trees and a balanced overall age profile to provide the ‘veterans of the future’. Creating new wood pasture will create benefits for epiphytic lichens, saproxylic invertebrates and other species such as Glow Worm and Nightingale.

Puttenham Common was once a much more open heathland habitat – as shown by these images, 1809, 1940s, 2021

2. Reintroducing grazing – we will be introducing 16 of Hampton’s Sussex cattle to graze areas of the common. This grazing will maintain open habitats, diversify habitat structure and create wider ecosystem benefits by providing dung for a range of invertebrate species, creating areas of poached and open ground for specialist plant species and invertebrates such as burrowing bees and wasps, and reducing excessive soil nutrient levels that suppress more delicate native plants. Grazing also reduces nutrient levels over time, which is important for heathland and grassland habitats as high nutrient levels supress biodiversity. Key bird species such as Nightjar and Woodlark will benefit from the increase in open habitats, as well as reptiles.

We will be using a NoFence grazing system, which means we mark out grazing compartments on an app and our cows wear collars that keep them in the compartment via an audio warning system. The audio warning is a scale of tones, which starts at a low pitch and rises gradually as the animal moves through the boundary zone. If the whole scale has been played, a mild, but effective electric pulse will be given. The animal then learns to recognise the audio warning and turns around to avoid the electric pulse. NoFence is used across the world and locally by organisations such as Surrey Wildlife Trust.

You can see where the cows are on the common right now by scanning this QR code. For all cow related enquires please ring us on 01483 951666.

3. Control the expansion of bracken – bracken can quickly become dominant on Puttenham Common and reduce ecological diversity. Historically, this process would have been controlled by the taking of bracken as a crop, we will do this through mechanical cutting and removal.

‘There is a very limited area of land in Great Britain that is suitable for the restoration of such habitats, as each requires certain geology, soil and hydrological conditions that are spatially very limited. In short, the area covered by this Management Plan represents a very uncommon opportunity to deliver substantial biodiversity enhancement.’ EPR 2023

Climate change

The primary purpose of our project at Puttenham Common is to help the unique heathland biodiversity recover, but it is also a very important carbon store – according to Natural England, heathland stores 100 tonnes of carbon per hectare. Due to climate change, wildfires are becoming increasingly common on heathlands across Surrey. By rewetting the boggy mires across Puttenham Common (through tree removal which therefore reduces the rate of transpiration across the mire), we are hoping to reduce the chances of wildfire spreading.

Working in partnership

As well as working with Natural England and Surrey County Council on this exciting project, we are a pilot site for Space4Nature (a project combining satellite technology and artificial intelligence to monitor and improve wildlife habitats) and a key delivery partner in the Heathlands Connections Nature Recovery Project (a national Nature Recovery Network project, connecting heathlands across the Surrey Hills).

Recording biodiversity

We are delighted to be working with a range of recorders and ecological experts to record the species at Puttenham Common, we hope to see a resurgence in numbers and diversity over the lifespan of our project. We’d be delighted if you want to become more involved with identifying and recording species on Puttenham Common, through an organised group or the use of citizen science apps like iNaturalist. The more we can understand the precious habitat and species of Puttenham Common, the better.

Enjoying Puttenham Common

We hope you enjoy Puttenham Common with its beautiful views, peaceful walks and wonderful wildlife. Thank you for your support with this exciting new nature restoration project. Thank you for:

• Keeping your dogs under close control
  Puttenham Common is a very important habitat for ground nesting birds, so we need to avoid habitat disturbance, particularly during the nesting season (April to October).
• Picking up dog poo
  This is common etiquette for everyone’s enjoyment, but even more important with the introduction of cows on the common, as if our cows encounter dog poo, they can contract neosporosis which causes early abortions and still born calves. Dog poo can also cause eutrophication which is harmful to wildlife.
• Being kind to the cows
  Our cows are very friendly and won’t cause any bother, please be respectful of them. They may look like they are out on the loose because of their NoFence collars, but don’t worry, we are monitoring their whereabouts closely!
• Picking up litter

If you would like to see our 10 year management plan or ecological records, have any questions on our project or would like to get involved please email mollybiddell@hamptonestate.co.uk