As we wrap up another wonderfully busy year, we wanted to share a special moment of celebration with all of you. Our Christmas video was made with good cheer, plenty of laughs, and deep appreciation for everyone that makes Alscot the special and unique place it is.
We wish you all a bright and joyful Christmas and a happy and successful new year.
Thanks for being part of our journey!
We’re now in our second year of regenerative farming, and it’s been fantastic to see real progress taking shape.
As part of our commitment to sustainable land management, we’re grazing our SFI land with organic sheep – working in partnership with Daylesford Organic and other local farmers. Daylesford has provided 700 organic Lleyn sheep to graze between October and December across 650 acres of overseeded Alscot land, laid with herbal leys.
This approach not only supports soil health and biodiversity, but also contributes to the wider goal of sustainable and organic food production, which we believe is essential for healthy living.
We won Best Green Business in the Stratford Herald Business & Tourism Awards!! 🏆
Winning Best Green Business means the world to us because it recognises our vision for the future and the heart of everything we do — our commitment to sustainability, innovation, and creating a positive impact on our community and the planet. It’s a reflection of the hard work, vision, passion, and purpose that drive our team every day. This award reaffirms that doing business responsibly and protecting the environment can go hand in hand with success.
As part of our sustainable land management practices, we conduct baseline surveys and carefully monitor improvements in soil health, plant life, and wildlife diversity. Surveys across grasslands, woodlands, water bodies, and arable land are now well underway, helping us build a valuable dataset for the future.
A recent bird survey, carried out on the 5th and 6th of March, yielded encouraging results. A diverse selection of waterfowl was recorded, including teal, gadwall, mallard, snipe, moorhen, and little grebe. In the woodlands, red kites were observed nesting, while fieldfare and redwing thrushes—winter visitors to the UK—were noted both in the woods and on some grasslands. These birds were busily feeding, storing energy for their migration back to mainland Europe.
Despite the heavy rain and biting cold wind, it was muddy boots, wet weather gear and big smiles all the way at the Alscot Biodiversity Project Tree Planting Workshop on Sunday 13th February.
The Croft Preparatory School have embraced the collaboration with Alscot and Mr Tom Genders, Head of The Croft Eco Club, keen gardener, and environmentalist, held a voluntary Tree Planting Workshop for local primary school children.
Taking advantage of an opportunity to refurbish this traditional and substantial farmhouse with gardens, we set about work in Nov 2021 to update the property to suit modern day living.
The existing kitchen, downstairs WC and dining room were opened up into one large family space, with a brand new WC being converted from a pantry. A new fitted utility room was created from a disused cold store and an independent space, suitable for a home office or gym, was created from a boiler room.
Our work with local primary schools, through the Alscot Biodiversity Project, took us to Bridgetown Primary School, to help out in their eco garden. When Mrs Bishop appealed for help, we were delighted to assist with replacement timber for the children to use as seats around the fire pit. The rotten wood will remain in the garden and over time will form a habitat and shelter for wildlife.
In ‘Forest School’, the children are allowed to explore for themselves the natural environment, learning to appreciate and gain a respect for nature.
As a little gift from us, our foresters made the children a couple of timber mushrooms.
In the spring of 2021 we bid farewell to an old tree sited in a historic location on the Estate. The Common Walnut tree at the site of the former Cutlin Mill had been declared unsafe, as age, disease and environmental factors had all contributed to its demise and it was reduced to a standing monolith. In an attempt to resurrect life into the old site, located in a prominent position of Atherstone on Stour, we have today planted a replacement common walnut tree. The Juglans Regia, a large deciduous tree, attaining heights of 25–35 m (80 to 120 ft), and a trunk up to 2 m (6 ft) in diameter, has been planted in the perfect spot to afford this light demanding tree plenty of sunlight.
Pre-war, an avenue of trees stood on Alscot land that started at Lodge Park and swept across the land as far as Top Park. Using the two remaining oak trees as the starting point, a new avenue of oak trees has been planted across Lodge Park in the first phase to recreate the avenue that was lost to war time needs.
The new avenue is being planted to recognise James Holman-West’s forthcoming 21st birthday. Each of the 42 oak trees, 21 either side, were originally planted on the Estate over 10 years ago in a nursery woodland and have been transported using a mechanical tree spade.
It is hoped that eventually we can continue the avenue with another phase of planting.
Our team are busy planting 465 new trees in a variety of species in our woodlands.
This is to combat the devastation caused by Ash Die-Back, a disease with disastrous results for the landscape and biodiversity.
This method of forestry helps prevent major loss and counteracts the devastating impact on the woodlands and connecting habitats. Without action the disease will spread and we could lose more trees than necessary as well as connecting hedge rows and other trees on surrounding land.
In addition we have planted 1,318 hedging plants of different species in various locations, by way of a positive attempt to rejuvenate existing hedgerows, as well as creating new ones.
New hedgerows follow Natural England’s suggested species to encourage biodiversity and are a mix of 80% hawthorn and the remaining 20% made up of field maple, dog wood, hazel, midland hawthorn, spindle, wild privet, blackthorn and purging buckthorn.
The Alscot Community Calendar raised £1800 for the Church of St Mary, Preston on Stour.
We felt that the images shared on the Alscot Community Facebook page, all taken by amateur photographers depicting life on the Estate, deserved to be shared further and so we created a calendar for the coming year as a platform to showcase a selection of these wonderful images.
All images were blind chosen (no names on the photographs) and the calendar features photographs from 15 different members of the local community.
As a leading project of its type, we are pleased to continually welcome Government officials and representatives and members of local and county authorities, to the Alscot Biodiversity Project and our aims for carbon neutrality.
Our latest event took in the site on foot and we, along with our team of expert ecologists, showcased our current flagship project and future development plan to expand Biodiversity land.
Earlier this summer we held a presentation to announce the winners and award the prizes of the Alscot Biodiversity Art Competition; a project for local primary school children to design a logo that represents nature in Warwickshire.
Since then we have been working hard to finalise the official logo to represent the connection between education and the Alscot Biodiversity Project, and particularly our engagement with local primary schools. The creation is a collaboration of elements taken from some of the winning pieces of art and we think this depicts biodiversity on the Estate, and our responsibility to the planet, beautifully.
Following David Hall’s retirement last year, we were finally able to gather together to pay tribute to David’s long service.
The sun shone and the setting was perfect for friends and family to wish David the happiest of retirements.
After more than 60 years working on Estate land, man and boy, David took retirement in 2020.
On Tuesday 7th September, the Holman-West family invited David to their home, Alscot Park, along with colleagues, friends and family to enjoy afternoon tea and celebrate the retirement he truly deserves.
Loretta and Nat took up the challenge to walk 26 canal path miles from Birmingham to Stratford upon Avon, to raise funds for Alzheimer's UK.
The Alzheimer’s Society works hard in changing the landscape for all forms of dementia forever.
Three months of training, with over 350 miles clocked up, paid off and they completed the 26.7 mile walk on Friday 27th August in 7 hours 8 minutes.
Alscot aims to achieve carbon neutral status by 2050, thus assisting climate change.
It is our mission to work to secure a future for plant and animal species by the improvement and enhancement of natural grasslands and woodlands, encouraging rare and almost extinct species to thrive. The principal to establish a functioning ecosystem, where nature is given as much freedom as possible, is a leading influence for all future land projects at Alscot. Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) is a key component in achieving these objectives.
