Name: Whites Drove
Size: 12 acres
Date rewilding began: Sep 2017
Whites Drove is drier and more classically 'meadow-like' that some of our other sites. Like all of our land it had been cut for silage and grazed by sheep or cattle for many years. Compared to the land at Godney Marshes though this site came with higher flower diversity.
In spring the field hosts large stands of marsh orchids, ground bugle while in summer marsh thistles, meadowsweet and ragwort are the dominant plants. In the ditches loosestrife, reeds, and water mints are common. The site contains a number of old trees along the hedges - particularly alder - and an expanding copses and hedges of birch, aspen, willow and oak in the middle. The field has been grazed occasionally (roughly every two years), setting up an interesting contrast with the land at Waste Drove which has been ungrazed.
Orchids in the grass, Summer 2022
Whites Drove - named after the track which runs along side it - is made up of two six acre fields not far from Westhay National Nature Reserve, between the villages of Lower Godney and Panborough. Bought in 2017 it was the second site purchased by the founder of Somerset Wildlands, Alasdair Cameron, and is owned independently of the charity. The fields now form one of Somerset Wildlands' affiliated sites.
While this site has not had formal monitoring, larger wildlife using the site has included otter, roe deer, brown hare, badger, fox, harvest mouse, field vole and stoat. Since the project began grass snakes have become common, while a host of small song birds like stone chats, gold finches, reed warblers, willow warblers, Cettis warblers, blackcaps, snipe and even the occasional curlew all use the land.
Burnet moth on marsh thistle, Summer 2022
Marsh thistle
Meadow brown butterfly, 2018
Thick foliage and flowers, summer 2022
Aerial view of the land in 2018
Grass snake - one of many now found on the land.
Palmate newt found during reptile surveys
Hares are a common site at Whites Drove
Badgers are regular night time visitors