Every so often you hear a truly inspiring nature conservation story. My visit to the Weobley branch meeting in December to hear a talk on Mowley Wood was one such occasion.  Situated between Titley and Staunton-on-Arrow in west Herefordshire, Mowley Wood is an unspoilt wooded valley that time forgot. There's no intensive farming with pesticides or herbicides. There’s not even a footpath winding its way through the valley, just the River Arrow and the narrow floodplain meadow that was once used by drovers’ who stopped to let their animals feed and regain strength before continuing east.

In just three years since the habitat restoration work started, the project team are seeing breeding otters; Atlantic salmon are spawning, the threatened European eel is present in the river, and there's a healthy population of the native white clawed crayfish. The once heavily grazed meadows are now alive with butterflies and insects feeding on the nectar-rich wildflowers.

The 150 acre Mowley Wood site has become home to wildlife pushed out by intensively farmed land nearby. Owner Edward Bulmer initiated the habitat restoration work in 2019 with a 4-person team – project manager Catherine Janson, nearby farmer and keen conservationist Tony Norman, David Griffith and Sarah Cadwallader – each bringing their expertise and a lot of hard work to the project.

With grant funding from the Environment Agency, the aim of the project aim was to increase the range of habitats within the site, to protect the soil and increase carbon capture, and provide resilience to flooding. 

Interesting things happen at the boundary between different habitats – be it the scrub at the edge of woods, the boggy land by the river or the longer grass within a meadow.  The project team are allowing wider margins to develop between habitats to encourage a greater range of species.

As well as otters; polecats, stoats and hares have been spotted. Pied flycatchers are breeding summer visitors, along with, redstarts, blackcap and resident marsh tits. Red kites nest in the woods and the herons are coming back.

“We spent a lot of time looking and observing at the start” said Catherine Janson, project leader. “We wanted to learn what wildlife was there and then plan how we could improve the habitats. In the woods, we’ve brought back coppicing and created sunny rides and have been rewarded with sightings of the stunning silver washed fritillary in the woodland clearings.”

The woodland has standard oaks with standing dead trees which are ideal for beetles, invertebrates and fungi feeding on the rotting material. Tree planting is from local seed with some natural colonisation from the woodland edges.

Once the sheep were removed from the meadows, it was easy to see which areas still retained a diverse range of wildflowers – highlights being meadow saxifrage, ladies mantle and pignut. Wildflowers rarely die off unless they are smothered by stronger growing grasses - they may not flower but hang on in there waiting for the time they can. Where the pasture was poor, the top surface was lightly harrowed and seed collected from nearby SSSI meadow belonging to Tony Norman was hand sowed and the land then rolled.

By managing the meadow in the traditional way which involves aftermath grazing once a hay crop has been taken, the insect life during the summer months is now a sight to behold. So far over 400 species of moth have been identified, 13 different species of dragonfly and the rarely reported Essex skipper seen. Thistles, discouraged from farmers’ fields, have been allowed to grow along the woodland margins as they are an important source of nectar for the wide range of butterfly species seen in Mowley.

The project team observed where the land beside the river flooded when the Arrow was in spate and encourage rushes and longer grass in those areas to slow down the water flow. Where springs emerge from the valley sides, wetlands have been created providing home for wildfowl.

I’m really impressed how much has been achieved in just 3 years. Ultimately the project team would love to grow the wildlife corridor along the Arrow valley and catchment connecting and creating good habitat on brooks and river. I hope they realise their ambition.