Kent estate to become Government conservation case study

Godmersham estate to become a case study

In a rare example of a local council working positively with the shooting community, a Kent estate is set to become a showcase for how gamekeeping boosts biodiversity.

Kent County Council’s conservation team visited Godmersham Park Estate near Canterbury in September to see first-hand the results of a decade’s habitat work, and will now make it a case study for the county’s nature recovery plan.

Council receive guided tour

Estate manager Ben Palmer and gamekeeper Adam Horn showed Kent County Council officers Chris Drake and Rachel Boot their approach to conservation: creating habitat like wader scrapes, providing year-round wild bird food, and controlling predators.

The estate has focused on four areas over the past decade – wetlands, woodland, chalk downland and field margins – aiming to maximise biodiversity without harming the estate’s profitability.

Seeing the results of habitat work

Work has included planting nearly four miles of new hedgerows, bringing 50 acres into a Higher Level Countryside Stewardship Scheme, creating three miles of beetle banks, establishing wildflower margins and wild bird seed mixes, and erecting more than 400 bird boxes. The team has also fenced round the estate to prevent damage from deer browsing and changed how 100 acres of downland banks are managed.

The results include the return of lapwing, nightingales, barn owls, grey partridge and kestrels.

Council impressed

Mr Drake, Kent’s Making Space for Nature project officer, said Ben Palmer and Adam Horn “clearly know the area intimately and have vastly improved the fortunes of wildlife there in recent years. The quality and range of the habitats and number of scarce species that are now thriving there was most impressive.”

The team will return in spring to create a detailed case study to accompany the Kent and Medway Local Nature Recovery Strategy, due for publication at the end of 2025. Local Nature Recovery Strategies are plans developed under the Environment Act 2021 that identify where conservation action will have the most impact.

Comments from the estate and BASC

Mr Palmer said: “We really enjoyed their enthusiasm and were delighted that they recognised the fundamental importance of the shoot in helping to deliver the biodiversity gains that we have achieved across the Estate in recent years.”

BASC, which contributed to the consultation on Kent’s nature recovery strategy and has more than 4,000 members in the county, facilitated the visit. Regional officer, Felicity Winters, said: “The practical conservation work that estates like Godmersham Park undertake showcases how shooting can uplift habitat and species recovery.”

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