Natural England

Three new additions to a herd of water buffalo are keeping nature reserve staff busy on a Cambridgeshire fen.

Chippenham Fen National Nature Reserve, managed by Natural England, is welcoming the Asian Water Buffalo as their newest recruits and brings the total on the site to nine.

The hefty beasts graze the toughest of vegetation and break up scrub with their powerful horns and are a great example of how land can be managed using unconventional animals.

Reserve Manager Kevin Warrington said: “We are really pleased with the buffalo and the effect they are having on the various habitats in the reserve. They are managing an area of about 100 acres and reducing scrub, enabling rarer and less competitive plant species to thrive”.

Extremely wet conditions and poor quality vegetation mean ordinary cattle would have a tough time grazing in the fen.

“Because they are so adaptable, we hope to be able to promote their use on other sites” added Kevin.

“We check them on average once a day. Each of the buffalo has its own personality although they all enjoy the peace and quiet of the reserve!” he said.

ENDS

Notes to editors

The reserve:

Chippenham Fen is a 105 hectare National Nature Reserve. National Nature Reserves were established to protect the most important areas of wildlife habitat and geological formations. There are over 200 in England.

Chippenham Fen is one of the best remaining areas of undrained, semi-natural fen in Europe. Over the past three decades, the fen meadows in the centre of the reserve had been mown. Due to an increasing area of fen, as invading woodland was pushed back; it was becoming ever more difficult to maintain these areas.

The buffalo:

The buffalo are creating a variation in vegetation structure, which in turn provides a series of microhabitats for the many rare plants and invertebrates, better than we could achieve using machinery. They thrive upon the poor quality grazing and site conditions are no hindrance to them; though biting flies and ticks result in them spending long periods wallowing in ponds and ditches.

In July 2001, English Nature (now a part of Natural England) began a grazing trial using Asian Water Buffalo (Bubalus bubalus) in Chippenham Fen National Nature Reserve, Cambridgeshire. Currently there are six buffalo steers but due to an ever increasing area being managed by the buffalo three more steers have now been purchased.

Please note:

Unfortunately there are no parking facilities at the reserve and access to the reserve is on foot from Chippenham village. The buffalo roam a wide area and may not always be seen from the public footpath.

For further information please contact the Natural England East of England press office: Linzee Kottman on 01223 533431/ 07824475359 linzee.j.kottman@naturalengland.org.uk Heather McMorland on 01733 455080, heather.mcmorland@naturalengland.org.uk Out of hours 07970 098005.