This Earth Day, we reflect on a year of meaningful progress, as Canterbury Oast Trust has taken important, practical steps to turn sustainability ambition into action.

We have begun strengthening our environmental governance, ensuring that responsibility for sustainability and carbon reduction is embedded within leadership decision‑making rather than treated as a standalone initiative. This has given us clearer oversight of where our impacts sit across operations, estates, and the supply chain.

We have also made progress in understanding and measuring our environmental footprint, developing a more structured approach to gathering greenhouse gas emissions data across Scopes 1, 2 and 3. While this is an evolving process, it provides the foundations needed to set meaningful targets and track progress over time.

Across our estates and operations, we are taking practical, evidence‑based steps to reduce energy use and improve efficiency. Reviewing how buildings are managed, how utilities are procured, and where smarter operational choices can reduce waste and emissions while supporting financial sustainability.

Importantly, sustainability is now being considered alongside commercial, operational and social outcomes. Environmental responsibility is increasingly factored into planning conversations, whether that’s estate investment, supplier relationships, or longer‑term business planning, ensuring that decisions made today remain resilient and responsible in the future.

Howard Clark, Director of Commercial Operations said “This work is ongoing, and there is still more to do. But these early actions represent a clear shift from intention to delivery and provide a solid platform as we work towards a 50% reduction in emissions by 2030 and Net Zero no later than 2050.”

At this time of year, Parsley Meadow at Rare Breeds Centre begins to offer a glimpse of what nature can achieve when we simply step back. Its swaying grasses, flowering patches, and quiet hum of pollinators are a prime example of “less is more”. Want to join in? You can, by taking part in No-Mow May. By pausing our mowers and allowing wild plants to thrive, we create vital habitat for bees, butterflies, and countless other species that depend on early‑season blooms. Parsley Meadow demonstrates that when we let nature lead, biodiversity returns, resilience grows, and our landscapes become richer for everyone.

Letting nature breathe: Why No‑Mow May is worth a try

As soon as spring arrives, most of us feel that familiar twitch to get the lawnmower out and tidy things up. But what if, just for one month, we held off a bit? What if we let the grass grow, let the flowers appear, and actually enjoyed a little natural freedom in the garden?

That’s what No‑Mow May is all about — a simple pause that gives bees, butterflies, and all sorts of tiny garden visitors a much‑needed boost after winter.

It’s a small change with a big impact

Skipping the mow for a few weeks might feel a bit rebellious, especially if you’re used to keeping things neat and tidy. But here’s the thing: those “weeds” that pop up — clover, daisies, dandelions — are basically a five‑star buffet for pollinators just waking up after the colder months.

You’re not ignoring your garden.
You’re helping it help wildlife.

And it honestly feels good to know that doing less can do so much more for the creatures that keep our ecosystems ticking.

Rewilding doesn’t mean letting Eeverything go wild

A common worry is that skipping the mow will leave your garden looking messy. But it doesn’t have to! If you approach it with a tiny bit of intention, a wilder lawn can still look cared‑for — even stylish.

A couple of simple tricks can make a world of difference:

• Keep a clean edge trim around paths or borders
• Put a small sign or marker saying you’re taking part in No‑Mow May
• Let one section grow, not the whole lawn
• Mow paths through the long grass to make it look purposeful

When you do these things, it stops looking like neglect and starts looking like a deliberate choice — which it is. A “managed messy” garden can actually look really charming.

A chance to slow down and notice more

One lovely thing about No‑Mow May is how it changes the way you interact with your garden. You start noticing things — tiny beetles, hoverflies, bees drifting from flower to flower, new birds popping in to check out the buffet.

When the lawn isn’t a perfectly trimmed carpet, it becomes a stage for all sorts of little wonders.

Why not keep a small wild corner all year?

If you find the wild look surprisingly beautiful in May, consider keeping a small patch like that all year round.

It doesn’t have to be huge — even a little corner behind the shed or a strip by the fence can become a permanent safe space for insects and other wildlife. It’s amazing how much life can fit into such a small area.

And because it’s just one patch, with tidy edges or paths around it, it still looks intentional — like you’re balancing order and nature, which is exactly what you’re doing.

Your garden, your choice — and your legacy

Taking part in No‑Mow May is a gentle way of saying:

“I want my garden to make a difference.”

It’s incredible how one small month-long decision can create space for so much life — and how good it feels to be part of that.

And when may ends…

You can mow again if you want. Or keep a wild patch. Or plant a few more pollinator‑friendly flowers. No‑Mow May isn’t a rulebook — it’s more like a friendly suggestion.

A reminder that sometimes the best thing we can do is simply step back… and let nature do her thing.

Having now settled into his new role, we have been chatting with Mark, our Environmental Conservation Officer, who has been busy exploring the farm and woodland. Here are some updates on his work focused on sustainable practices that work in harmony with the landscape at the Rare Breeds Centre.

Meadow restoration with the help of our rare breed sheep

As a first step in addressing the issue, Mark decided to let the farm’s rare breed sheep graze the meadow for a month over late summer. The sheep, with their natural preferences, expertly avoided the knapweed but they did consume a lot of grass. As a result, by late summer, there was far less grass to cut – just 7 bales compared to the usual 35!

This change made the cutting and baling faster, cheaper, and better for the environment. A traditional summer hay cut is essentially mimicking what grazing animals do naturally, and since we already have animals on the farm (which need to eat) this approach allows for a much more natural and sustainable way to care for the land and help it thrive.

Why using sheep is a much better choice

Less reliance on machinery is a good thing for many reasons, not just the most obvious ones like noise, pollution and fuel consumption. In this case, soil compaction, which is where heavy machinery “squashes” the soil. This is something we would like to avoid as much as possible as it means rainwater is more likely to just run off the soil rather than be absorbed. With our drier summers, due to climate change, it’s important we encourage what rainfall there is to be absorbed and to make good use of it.

After cutting the meadow, the sheep were brought back to graze again. Their grazing will mean we don’t have to cut the grass by machine again this year. Their gentle disturbance of the ground will also expose small patches of earth, and this will encourage some of the wildflowers that have been outcompeted by knapweed in recent years to flourish once more. A diverse pool of seeds is waiting patiently in the soil; they simply need a bit of light to be given a chance to thrive.

We can’t restore the meadow’s diversity overnight. But with a considered approach that benefits the farm in multiple ways, implemented consistently over time, we can encourage the many varied wildflowers to grow back naturally. Working in harmony with natural processes to help it do what it does best can create a wildflower meadow full of colour and life, providing food for our native species and habitats we can all enjoy.

Woodland management

We asked Mark about his approach to caring for woodland and he explained that even though our woods in the UK may look wild and natural, management of them has been an essential part of these environments for thousands of years. In many ways, we have “created” the woodlands around us over the centuries.

In the past, woodlands were managed carefully because people used the wood for things like tools, fencing, and fuel. But over the last 100–200 years, as people have stopped using these traditional products, many woodlands have been neglected. Unfortunately, without regular management to create a variety of habitats with a mixture of young and old plants, these “man-made” woodlands become overgrown and less diverse.

How we’re increasing our habitats

One of Mark’s plans is to make our main woodland paths, known as “rides”, more open. The additional space this creates with increased light reaching the woodland floor means various layers of vegetation can develop for all kinds of animals to inhabit. One of the important residents we have at the Rare Breeds Centre is the protected and elusive dormouse, shown below, who loves a bit of brambly scrub to scurry about in!

Woodland zones

The process of creating these rides starts with felling trees and cutting back vegetation to create several “zones”:

• First comes the path itself, which could be stone chip or simply a closely mown strip, that is easy to walk or drive down.
• Next comes what is called the herbaceous layer, which consists of grasses and small plants, and you may even spot the occasional wild orchid here.
• After this comes a shrub layer, small trees and, most likely, a decent amount of bramble.
• The final zone includes the taller trees that make up most of the woodland.

The woodland zone with the most biodiversity

Here’s an amazing fact: the number of species of plants and animals to be found in the first 10 metres of woodland, where there is a lot more light, is pretty much equal to the number you will find in the rest of the woodland put together! How’s that for biodiversity? It’s all down to that light and lots of different sizes and ages of plant. These sunny edges are great homes for butterflies, in particular. Although some butterflies prefer to be inside the woodland, you’ll see many more in the open spaces that surround or cut through it. By creating more of these bright, varied habitats, Mark can be sure to make the woodland an even better place for wildlife.

Woodland management is seasonal

Right now, Mark is working on something called “crown lifting,” which includes carefully removing the lower branches of some of the trees along the rides. This encourages the trees to put their energy into growing upwards into tall, healthy trees. This lets just a bit more sunlight reach the woodland floor, helping a few more flowers and smaller plants to grow. It’s like ride widening on a very small scale, but it all adds up.

Autumn and winter are the best times for this kind of work, as birds have finished nesting and the trees are resting for the season. Traditional woodland jobs, like coppicing (cutting some trees to encourage new shoots), have always been done in winter for the same reason, it keeps the wildlife safe and supports the trees’ natural cycle. By following the seasons and working with sympathy towards nature, Mark is helping the woodland be healthy, more diverse, and full of life.

How you can help and get involved

You can help us with these projects! If you would like to get involved with our conservation projects, either as an individual or part of a group, at the Rare Breeds Centre or Poulton Wood, please do get in contact with our volunteer coordinator. We’d love to hear from you!

Alternatively, if you’ve enjoyed visiting our woodland and would like to support our Accessibility Fundraiser, which helps fund improved signage across the farm and woodland, you can find out more and donate here!

Happy Wildlife Conservation Day! We caught up with Mark, our Conservation and Environment Officer, to hear about the exciting wildlife conservation projects he’s working on now and what he has planned for the future.

An important part of our Woodland Management Plan we are working on now will be its provision for one of our many species of furry friend we have at Rare Breeds Centre – the Hazel Dormouse. The name is a little misleading, as the important European Protected Species doesn’t rely specifically on hazel trees too much, but it comes from the fact the structure of hazel woodland that is coppiced on a relatively short rotation often makes for their ideal habitat.

When hazel is coppiced, which means to harvest it and encourage healthy new growth, more light is allowed to reach the woodland floor, and a diverse mosaic of trees, flowering plants, grasses and brambles springs to life. Throw a few native small trees into the mix, like the blackthorn, dogwood, field maple, guelder rose and spindle that thrive in many a Kent hedgerow, and you have a scrubby hotchpotch with plenty of the nuts, seeds, berries, flowers and insects that dormice love to eat. The important things here are plenty of cover and plenty of food.

It should then come as no surprise that dormice also love hedgerows, as the structure of these is very similar to coppiced woodland in many ways. A nice wide pathway or woodland glade also make for great dormouse habitat. The key to improving our dormouse population is to ensure we have plenty of all these habitats, and most importantly they all need to be joined up; connectivity is key. The reduction in traditional long-term woodland and hedgerow management is one of the main reasons why dormouse numbers in the UK have fallen by more than half over the last 15 years. We need to put this right!

On a walk-around with our resident dormouse expert towards the end of last summer I was encouraged to hear there is great potential for us to improve our dormouse numbers here at Rare Breeds Centre. Many aspects of our Woodland Management Plan that we hope we will have in place around this time next year, such as woodland thinning and traditional practices such as hedge laying, will in themselves be beneficial for dormice. If we go out of our way to ensure these things are all linked together in a dormouse-friendly way, with additional habitat creation thrown into the mix as well, then things look very promising. On that note, I’ll be planting a few native hedgerow trees this week, all the time daydreaming about how they may one day make a suitable home for some of our precious dormouse residents.

Today, 28th July, marks World Nature Conservation Day, a day dedicated to raising awareness about the vital importance of protecting our natural resources and preserving the environment for future generations.

We’re excited to welcome our new Environmental Conservation Officer, Mark, who joined the Rare Breeds team last week. Below, Mark shares insights into his role, his passion for the environment, and his hopes for the future of conservation on the farm.

Mark, right with Howard, our Director of Commercial Operations

Mark’s ethos

As Environmental Conservation Officer at Rare Breeds Centre I am responsible for managing and improving the biodiversity of the woodland, wildflower meadow and ponds at Highlands Farm. My background in forestry, primarily working sweet chestnut and hornbeam coppice in semi-natural ancient woodland in Kent, and relying on traditional methods such as using heavy horses for timber extraction, has laid the foundations for my woodland ethos that now guides my approach in all the management and conservation work I do.

Managing woodlands

The demand for the woodland products that gave rise to the managed woodlands we are surrounded by in Kent has waned over the last couple of hundred years or so, meaning many woodlands have been neglected and are now in poor condition. If these woodlands are managed in a similar way to in the past, which means the maintenance of open rides and pathways, the periodic felling of coppice and the thinning of new plantations, then the increased light levels and resulting regrowth are what drive the biodiversity gains we are after. For it to be a truly effective and holistic approach then we need to find uses for absolutely all the product as well. Specifically, here, the wood and any cut hay. Conservation for the sake of conservation will only get us so far.

A holistic approach

All the work we do here at Rare Breeds Centre needs to subscribe to this holistic ethos of informed management, minimal damage, zero waste and disciplined and timely interventions. This will result in a sustainable and biodiverse landscape that can be enjoyed by everyone who visits the farm and surrounding countryside, because a healthy and biodiverse landscape is a beautiful one. Ultimately, it’s about simply having a kind and considerate relationship with the natural landscape that surrounds us.”

Learn more about Conservation around the trust. Our conservation projects involve a great deal of dedicated work. If you’re interested in sponsoring one, learn more here.

The Rare Breeds Centre is primarily a farm attraction, however, with 100 acres of woodland, wildflower meadows and ponds, there is much more wildlife at our site than our visitors may realise. So, we asked our conservation officer to provide an update in celebration of  World Wildlife Conservation Day!

As we approach winter, much is changing in the wild world, as the weather drops, and daylight closes in. Winter berries are appearing onsite, such as hawthorn, blackthorn, spindle and holly, which birds and mice will rely on in their search for protein-rich foods. Many animals will be growing their thick winter coats ready for the changing weather on our site – these animals prepared for the cold include badgers and polecats.

 Getting ready for hibernation

It is time for the Kent Mammal Group to clean and close our dormouse boxes for the winter, as dormice head to the understory to hibernate under leaves and log piles. Other animals hibernating on our site include bats, such as the Daubenton’s bat and soprano pipistrelle which have previously been found on the site. Toads, frogs, great crested newts, smooth and palmate newts are all hibernating underneath rocks, in cracks and below the frost lines until spring; some great crested newts will even hibernate in the pond if conditions are perfect. Grass snakes, adders, lizards and slowworms will also join in the winter hibernation. Most butterflies and moths will also enter a dormant phase in the cold weather, similarly, the Butterfly Tunnel on our site is also shut down for the winter as they struggle to survive in the cold temperatures.

Bumblebee news

The Bumblebee Conservation Group have concluded their BeeWalks for the year, as the colonies die, and the new queens hibernate beneath the ground, ready to emerge next year and create a new colony. The BeeWalks occur once a month from March to October, when bumblebee activity is at its highest. Despite an overall decline in the UK bumblebee population, the Rare Breeds Centre site has still hosted a wide variety of species this summer, including Buff tailed bumblebees, Common carders, and the rare, Ruderal.

Fungus is among us!

All the autumn rain brought huge influxes of mushrooms of all kinds, from Turkey tails and Jelly ears to Sulphur tufts and Amanita. As we say goodbye to autumn and the winter rolls in, most fungi stop producing mushrooms but are very much still alive below the ground. The rain has also meant that ponds have filled back up, and streams around the site are flowing again after drying out in the summer months.

Preserving habitats

Winter is a great time of year to top up dead hedges after cutting back and clearing branches from the woodland floor. Hedges can be trimmed now that nesting season is over, and leaves swept from paths to prevent animals hibernating in areas where they may be harmed. The ground conditions in the woodlands will vary greatly over the winter months, with hard ground in the frosts, and much softer ground and mud when the frosts melt. Habitats will be carefully maintained and managed to ensure successful hibernation for our resident wildlife, and to ensure a suitable environment for emerging in spring.

If you visit the Rare Breeds Centre in the winter months and venture to the woodlands, be sure to be mindful of log piles and fallen leaves and keep an eye out for animals feeding on winter berries and sheltering from the wind.