MORE than 5km of hedgerow has been planted as part of a project to connect Hampshire's national parks.
Countryside charity CPRE Hampshire launched the Hampshire Hedge Project to reintroduce hedgerows after decades of decline.
The charity has been raising awareness of how important they are for wildlife and farmers across the county.
Ellie Banks, project officer at CPRE, spoke to the Romsey Forum on Thursday, June 27 to give an overview of the project and some recent updates.
The hedge will start at Copythorne in the New Forest and finish at Compton, on the edge of the South Downs, near Winchester.
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Ellie said: “We have had hedgerows for a couple of thousand years. The numbers have gone up and down over the years based on our farming systems. We had a big peak in hedgerows in the 1800s. After the Second World War there was a steep decline. Over the last 80 years, we have lost 52 per cent of our hedgerows in the UK. That's over 500,000km of hedgerow which is incredibly significant.”
She added: “We wanted to work in an area of Hampshire that wasn't protected as a national park. So we thought we would use hedgerows to connect the New Forest and the South Downs National Park. We want to connect up not just the national parks but also local nature reserves along the way. For example, I would like to connect up Fishlake Meadows and Ampfield Wood. The project is about raising awareness of hedgerows and we are doing this in lots of different ways. We hope to inspire others to do more on their land and to talk about hedgerows more.
“I go into schools, I do talks and also run training courses. We have gone through year one of the three-year project.
“We've planted just over 5km of hedgerow which is about 25,500 plants which is amazing. It was hard work and a big challenge, but we did it. We ran 18 days of hedgelaying training, we had six one-day courses and six two-day courses. We trained up 159 people over the winter.”
For more details about the project, visit cprehampshire.org.uk/what-we-care-about/hedgerows/the-hampshire-hedge/.
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