The Wildlife Trust of South & West Wales (WTSWW) have been using grazing animals to improve grasslands on their reserves as part of their Healthy Resilient Grasslands Project, made possible thanks to Nature Network Funding.
“They are working to benefit our grassland habitats and species 24 hours a day, 365 days of the year, delivering conservation outcomes that no human or machine could ever achieve”, that’s how Paul Thornton, WTSWW Reserves Manager for Swansea, Neath-Port Talbot and Carmarthenshire, describes the ponies and cattle working on the Trust’s nature reserves.
On Gower, the funding has enabled the purchase of equipment and infrastructure to give livestock keepers the confidence to put grazing animals onto challenging coastal reserves. As a result of these partnerships, some of the rarest plants in the UK, including Goldilocks Aster, can now be found flourishing. This species was believed to be lost from the site, but its discovery shows the value of conservation grazing on the Trust’s coastal grasslands.