South Downs Farmers Group - Nov walkover

Last week Simon, Sophie and I from the catchment team attended a farm walkover of Rushmere Farm, a beautiful farm with lots of exciting projects!

This was part of the South Downs Farmers group which gathers farmers from across the South Downs to share ideas and farm in sustainable ways that benefit the environment. We’re a part of this group as farming in our catchment poses a risk to the water quality, so we want to work with the farmers to help them reduce their nitrate inputs to protect our water sources! In particular Rushmere Farm is in SPZ1 for the Havant & Bedhampton Springs and have benefited from PW PES grants in the past.

Historically the farm was a traditional arable farm, however, has recently undergone regeneration to become an organic farm. We spent the first part of the walkover discussing the crop rotations on the fields and then moved on to have a look at some fields leased to Hampshire veg box - a company that supplies seasonal and local veg across Hampshire. They were growing lots (including 7 different types of lettuce) so definitely worth checking out if you’re looking to buy local and support farmers. We also got to see the farms latest business endeavour of producing oat milk! And even got to take some back to the office!

Lastly, we headed over to see the farms new hedgerows which were funded by Portsmouth Water. Hedgerows provide vital habitat for wildlife on farms, increasing biodiversity which overall benefits the water quality in the long run. It’s always great to see PW funded projects, but it was also very useful to be able to chat to the farmers about the usefulness of hedgerows, why they’re needed and to be able to tailor our grants to what they need and what works for them!

We finished off the night over some delicious homemade pizzas, which we even had a go at making ourselves.