Beavers and Adonis Blues: a day away from Hothfield Heathlands

Margery Thomas, volunteer at Hothfield Heathlands describes an excursion to Ham Fen and Coombe Down taken by her and the volunteers to see conservation efforts at work there.

On a proper sunny August day, Ian Rickards took some of the hard-working Ashford volunteer team to visit two very different Kent Wildlife Trust reserves in the East of Kent: Ham Fen, the last surviving ancient fen in Kent, just west of Sandwich and Coombe Down in Dover.

At Ham Fen, long-time volunteer cattle-checker Roland (works at Pegwell Bay on Wednesdays, goes fishing on Thursdays) gently moved the glossy black Aberdeen Angus cattle and three water buffalo on as we took the marshy path through tall swathes of wild flowers to the fen. This is where the beavers have, for the last 22 years, been re-engineering this landscape of deep peat and running water. 

They slow the water flow, build dams to raise the water level and create deep pools around their lodges, making other pools and marshes in the process. The dams are built of logs they fell and drag to the dam site, packing it solid with mud. If they hear water trickling, they block it with new wood or scoops of mud. 

The beavers’ lodge, also built of branches, bark and mud, is now several metres in diameter and height and barely visible, topped with hemp agrimony, reeds and giant hogweed. The lodge entrance is underwater, with sticks of willow stuck in the bed outside the lodge so they can access fresh food if the surface freezes in winter. The beaver pool is quiet and secluded, a favourite spot for the kingfisher, surrounded by head-high flowers tangled with hops and the hawthorns that the beaver seem to leave alone. 

Mature oaks standing in water have died, providing safe perches for the turtle doves who now breed here. Beaver are nocturnal and dislike the hot sun so we saw none. There is no public access, but the evening safaris run by Kent Wildlife Trust are the best way of getting a glimpse of these reclusive animals.

Kent Wildlife Trust were the first to re-introduce European beaver into a contained reserve in this country and the initial three kits and a pair have thrived and bred. Beavers can now be observed on the River Stour, including from the Sainsbury’s car park in Canterbury, and at Conningbrook Lakes in Ashford where pointed-pencil stumps left by their tree felling are very evident.

A wetland habitat, Ham Fen is full of life. This image shows the waters surrounded by reeds and an old tree standing proud against the sky ©Alan Boulter

The next site we visited, Coombe Down, one of the very steep hills in Dover, was bought by Kent Wildlife Trust in 2017 to link with Old Park Hill and Nemo Down. Badly degraded, Coombe Down is also being restored to a mosaic of woods, scrub and chalk downland, Europe’s version of the rainforest with up to 40 species of flowering plants in just one square metre. 2.5% of the UK’s chalk grassland is found just around Dover.

A slope above Crabble Athletic football ground that was cleared of trees and scrub last winter is now covered in flowers, primarily mignonette, after the July rains. More clearance with heavy plant is planned for next winter. We hiked on up through scrubby woodland and huge banks of brambles (sun-warmed blackberries, mmm) to the crown of the hill with open sward spangled with flowers and butterflies, to the top of a steep slope of glorious flower-rich chalk downland, maintained by grazing, with a view to the Channel, ferries and France, and the Kent Wildlife Trust team working on Nemo Down opposite. Joy in discovering among all delights the harebells, autumn ladies’ tresses, centaury, dainty skeletons of quaking grass, and many adonis blue butterflies, the emblem of the Kent Wildlife Trust.

Harebells flowering in grassland in the foreground and a blue clear sky showing in the background ©Margery Thomas

It was great to catch up with everyone and impressive to see sites at such different stages of development, representing years of paid and voluntary work, massive fund-raising, vision and planning. I’ve no room to list the birds, insects, butterflies, day-flying moths and myriad flowers we saw. But at both sites everyone lamented the paucity of butterfly and moth species that should have been feeding on the banquets of flowers. As Roland said, ‘for many species it’s been a bad year.’

Learn more about nature reserves

Volunteers at Hothfield Heathland in winter with frost on the grass.
© Joanna Boult

Winter wanderings on Hothfield Heathlands

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Volunteer, Margery Thomas, explores winter on Hothfield Heathlands - one of Kent's last four valley bogs and one of its few remaining fragments of open heath.