Culmstock Beacon, a stone hut on the Blackdown Hills escarpment, looking over the Devon countryside

Devon · Somerset border

Caring for the
Blackdown Hills

We promote the conservation, protection and improvement of this remarkable landscape — its wildlife, its heritage and the people who live and work among the hills.

Explore our work

About the Trust

A community-born charity for a living landscape

The Blackdown Hills Trust was formed in the summer of 2010 and received charitable status that October. Our five founding board members were all part of the Local Stakeholders' Group of the Neroche Scheme — the Heritage Lottery-funded partnership that restored the forests and commons of the northern hills — and they created the Trust to carry that conservation work into the future.

Our trustees all live in or near the Blackdown Hills. Between them they bring a diverse range of local interests — farming, forestry and the arts — and include parish councillors, officers and members of local groups, and sporting and leisure associations. The Trust is a company limited by guarantee, making grants to individuals and organisations, sponsoring and undertaking research, and acting as a resource body for local groups who share our aims.

Our flagship project

Conservation cattle grazing

The Neroche Scheme cleared great swathes of conifer plantation to return the northern scarp to its earlier form of open heathland and woodland pasture — and the seeds buried beneath the forest floor responded: rare marsh fritillary and wood white butterflies returned, alongside nightingales and wood warblers. But cleared land left alone quickly tangles back into scrub. The answer was innovative: low-intensity grazing by English Longhorn cattle — hardy, docile and happy to munch almost anything.

300 haof coniferous plantation harvested to restore pasture, heath and broadleaf woodland
246 haof newly opened rough grazing across four large grazing units
100+English Longhorn cattle grazing the forest through the seasons
English Longhorn cattle grazing on the Blackdown Hills
English Longhorns at work on the northern scarp

The Trust's role

The Trust has taken over management of the grazing. As tenants of the Forestry Commission we manage the felled areas under the Higher Level Stewardship scheme, with two local farmers contracted to manage the cattle — whose overall welfare remains with the Forestry Commission.

In the summer months you can find the herd in the forest and see for yourself how their munching and chomping keeps the landscape in good heart, so that plants and wildlife alike can continue to thrive.

Heritage

Looking after the hills' history

Wellington Monument

Standing 175 feet tall on the northern edge of the hills, the Wellington Monument is the tallest three-sided obelisk in the world — built to commemorate the Duke of Wellington's victory at Waterloo, and a landmark known to everyone travelling the M5.

One of our trustees serves as a Monument Champion, and the Trust backed the National Trust's campaign to save the Grade II* monument after it was fenced off in 2005. The major restoration that followed has secured its future, and this much-loved landmark once again welcomes visitors.

Tricky Warren airfield — RAF Culmhead

Hidden in the forest are the remarkable remains of a Second World War airfield: three Scheduled Monuments including 15 structures of national importance, with many more of regional significance.

Working in partnership with Historic England and the Blackdown Hills National Landscape team, we helped deliver a Heritage Environment Programme for the site — collating historic records, surveying the condition of the surviving buildings, and preparing an education package so more people can understand the site's wartime story. Some structures may yet find new purpose as roosts for bats and owls.

Other work

Supporting people and projects across the hills

Beyond our own projects, the Trust acts as an umbrella and resource body for conservation in the Blackdown Hills — making grants, sponsoring research and backing local initiatives.

The hills

A hidden ridge between two counties

The Blackdown Hills rise quietly along the border of Devon and Somerset — a ridge of high, green country designated a National Landscape (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty). Steep wooded scarps, spring-fed valleys, ancient commons and wide skies make it one of the South West's least-spoilt places, and the Trust's remit covers the whole of it.

Sunset over the Blackdown Hills
Evening light over the hills
Bluebells in woodland on the Blackdown Hills
Bluebells in the hill woods
The Wellington Monument above the fields of the Blackdown Hills
The Monument above the fields

Governance

Our trustees

The Trust is a charitable company, governed by its Memorandum and Articles of Association. The trustees give their time voluntarily and receive no remuneration.

Neil CarterChair of Trustees
Robert David LloydTrustee
Michael CanhamTrustee
David Henry MounseyTrustee

Contact

Get in touch

To ask about our work, discuss a project or apply for a grant, contact the Trust:

The Blackdown Hills Trust Blowiscombe Barn Clayhidon, Cullompton Devon EX15 3TL [email protected] 01823 660764