A survey of cattle grazed woodlands in Britain

Photo: Isobel Cameron

Perceived benefits

Cattle are thought to provide biodiversity benefits in woodlands when grazed at low density since they eat dense vegetation of a low digestibility and break up vegetation mats with their hooves. This opens up the ground layer vegetation and is thought to be beneficial for tree regeneration as well as leading to a greater variety of vegetation types and associated invertebrate and bird assemblages. Because of these perceived benefits there is increasing interest in the use of cattle as a tool for nature conservation management in woodlands.

Information available?

Little information is available, however, with which the impacts of a given cattle grazing regime on a particular woodland can be predicted. Indeed there have been virtually no published studies of the impact of cattle on woodlands in Britain and very few in other countries. Additionally, there is little information available on the current use of woodlands for cattle grazing in Britain.

Study objectives

This study, which began in 2000, had the following objectives:

Gain an overview of the number, distribution, size and type of sites where cattle are currently being grazed in woodlands in mainland Britain.
Collate information on the reason for stocking with cattle, the cattle stocking regime, breed of cattle and the presence of other grazing animals at each site.
Collate observational information from site managers on cattle behaviour in woodlands.
Collate observational information on tree regeneration in the presence of cattle.
If possible, draw conclusions about the impacts of cattle on woodlands and draw out generalisations about the effect of different stocking regimes.
Recommend further work to improve our ability to predict the impacts of different grazing regimes of cattle on different woodland types.

Results

The study was completed in 2005 with the production of the following report:

PDF Report on the Survey of Cattle-grazed Woodland in Britain ^(PDF-667K)

For further information

Related publications

Contact

Dr Helen Armstrong
Ecology Division
Forest Research
Northern Research Station
Roslin
Midlothian EH25 9SY

Tel: +44 (0)131 445 6954
Fax: +44 (0)131 445 7335
Email: helen.armstrong@forestry.gsi.gov.uk

| | | |