Arger Fen & Spouse's Vale

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Pleas help e

Harvest mouse David Kjaer

Please help us buy 76 acres of rolling countryside alongside Arger Fen & Spouse’s Vale nature reserve

A wonderful chance to create a sweeping landscape of grassy heath – an echo of the wild furzy commons south Suffolk has lost

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The lost landscape of Leavenheath Arger Fen & Spouse’s Vale is known as one of the best bluebell woods in Suffolk, but this beautiful part of the county has much more to offer nature lovers.The 1783 map of Suffolk shows a scattering of rough, furzy commons across the south of the county, from Sudbury to Nayland. Over the centuries, these have all but disappeared, marked only by village names and clumps of bracken and gorse on roadside verges and field edges. One of the largest of these south Suffolk heaths was at Leavenheath.

Buying the 76 acres of farmland at Ford’s Heath is an opportunity for us to create something akin to this lost landscape. Most of the land is a large, sweeping arable field with poor, stoney soil. Our plan is to let nature take the lead, helped along by some light grazing, to enable a grassy commons landscape to develop.

During theTrust’s first 50 years, our efforts have necessarily focused on saving Suffolk’s pristine habitats as nature reserves. Looking to the future, we will increasingly need to think more creatively to seek new opportunities for wildlife on marginal farmland like this.

We still need to raise £110,000 to buy this beautiful piece of countryside

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Ford’s Heath 76 acres

Leavenheath village

Arger Fen & Spouse’s Vale 194 acres

Red campion

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These 15 acres of dry grassland, woodland and fen meadow along the valley side are already valuable habitats. They offer a taste of what we aim to achieve across the sweep of arable land.

Footpaths & trails

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Letting nature take the lead Naturalists have long recognised the value of mosaics of habitat. As our countryside has become tidier, the mixed-up edges where habitats meet and merge into one another have been lost. These places – where rough grassland and bramble blend into scrub and woodland – are rich in insects, birds and reptiles. By letting nature take the lead we will encourage this transformation.

Walking around the reserve gives a wonderful sense of being part of the landscape. It feels like a substantial piece of countryside – and indeed it is. With the addition of Ford’s Heath, the nature reserve will stretch across 270 acres of ancient woodland, fen meadow, wet woodland and the rich mix of new habitats developing through natural regeneration. We plan to create a new circular walk to link Ford’s Heath with the rest of the reserve and Leavenheath village.

Large as it will be, the extended reserve is still but a piece in the jigsaw of the wider landscape.

Our conservation advisers, are working with neighbouring landowners to ensure the reserve is part of a well connected landscape, linked to surrounding ancient woods, hedges and grassland used by dormice and reptiles.

Tony Flashman

Transforming isolated nature reserves into joined-up Living Landscapes means futurelooking land purchases like this will do even more for wildlife.

Skylark

The rough commons o south Suffolk have go forever, but at Ford’s we can let nature put much-needed untidin back into the country Julian Roughton Chief Execut

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Ian Pratt

The thick hedges here spill out into the neighbouring dormouse woodland. We will encourage bramble and scrub to develop, to extend the networks of habitat for dormice into Ford’s Heath.

Dormouse

Arable

Grassland & wet fen

Ford’s Heath Leavenheath village

Alder carr woodland

ons of e gone rd’s Heath put some idiness ntryside

Dormouse hedgerows Lakes & ponds

Fen meadow

Ancient woodland

Arger Fen & Spouse’s Vale

xecutive

Young woodland

Our 2013 surveys revealed thriving populations of grass snake and common lizard. Achieving our ambition for a well connected landscape will encourage these growing populations to recolonise the surrounding areas.

Ancient woodland

Common lizard

Rough grassland

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Creating a new landscape for wildlife We are very grateful to Gerald Ford for remembering Suffolk WildlifeTrust in his Will.This lovely patch of wildlife-filled countryside will be his legacy to Suffolk.

As the habitats mature it will become a haven for wildlife and a place for people to cherish – for generations to come.

Bigger sites are undoubtedly better for wildlife and so seizing opportunities to acquire land alongside our nature reserves is always a priority.

Gerald Ford

Mr Ford’s generosity made it possible for us to think big and act quickly when the farmland was put up for sale. Without his support, the opportunity would have been lost.

Gerald loved Suffolk – the county of both his parents, and always wished to leave some permanent presence here He was a life-long naturalist and would have been delighted to see his legacy being used to create a space for wildlife

Buying Ford’s Heath is a chance to create something spectacular Please do help if you can

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A gift in your Will Buying and enlarging nature reserves is one of the most powerful ways in which we secure a better future for wildlife. Legacy gifts make this possible – indeed they have been instrumental in every land purchase in recent years.

Perhaps more than any other nature reserve, the growth of Arger Fen & Spouse’s Vale demonstrates Suffolk Wildlife Trust’s vision to create large areas for wildlife – and the impact of legacies in making this happen.

The growth of Arger Fen & Spouse’s Vale since the gift of Spouse’s Grove in 1991

2014

1991 1997

2012 2005

2008

Photos: Steve Aylward & Clare Sheehan

Maps reproduced under OS licence number 10016410

03/07/2014

DavidTipling

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Yes, I’d like to help buy Ford’s Heath Thanks to the legacy gift from Gerald Ford we now need to raise £110,000 more to complete the land purchase.

Ever dona y will htion elp

Donate by phone 01473 890089 Donate online suffolkwildlifetrust.org Donate by cheque / debit card / credit card

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If we exceed our target for the land purchase, we will dedicate your donation to other habitat projects at the reserve

Suffolk Wildlife Trust

Brooke House, Ashbocking Ipswich IP6 9JY 01473 890089 info@suffolkwildlifetrust.org Registered charity no 262777

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