A National Nature Reserve, Sites of Special Scientific Interest, a Special Protection Area, a Special Area of Conservation... this area has them all, reflecting it's national and international importance for nature conservation.  Amongst it's specialties area grey seals, stunning displays of coastal wildflowers - some of them very scarce, peregrine falcons and chough - the rare red-legged red-billed member of the crow family.

Conservation organizations are actively managing the coastline to sustain its variety of habitats and species - its biodiversity.  The RSPB, for instance, own and manage Ramsey Island, while the National Trust look after much of the mainland coastline, including the spectacular St Davids Head.  The National Park for its part, has launched a scheme called Gwarchod Y Godiroedd - Conserving the Coastal Slopes.

The scheme was set up to tackle the decline of traditional farming practices such as grazing, cutting and burning, which over the centuries helped to create cliff-top habitats like coastal heath and maritime grassland, for which the National Park is now internationally important.  The decline of such activities over the last few decades has led to the spread of invasive plants like gorse, bracken and bramble, which threaten the biodiversity of the cliff-tops.  The chough, for instance cannot feed on such overgrown areas, requiring instead the short insect rich grassland created through traditional grazing.

In the St Davids area, the National Park has set up several agreements with local farmers, whereby they can receive grants for farming in a sustainable way.

In some places this includes grazing with traditional breeds such as Welsh Mountain ponies and Welsh Black cattle, which thrive on the rougher ground and help trample the bracken.  The open areas produced allow a wider diversity of plants to flourish.  These in turn support a wider range of insects, which in turn provide food for the birds like the declining skylark.  The dung contains insects which are an important winter food source for the chough, whilst any bare patches created are important germination sites for seedlings of plants like heather.

Alongside grazing, scrub and bracken are controlled through cutting and burning, with which the National Park provides free assistance to coastal farmers.  Controlled burning is carried out over the winter months so that there is minimal disturbance to wildlife.  The land also recovers very quickly when burnt at this time of the year - new green shoots are usually seen within just a few weeks of the burn.

Some farmers in the St Davids area have also been encouraged to leave their arable fields as stubbles over the winter, as spilt grain in these fields provides an important winter food source for the declining farmland birds, even the chough.  The fields are then sown in the spring.  Unfortunately the trend these days is for such stubbles to be ploughed in following the harvesting of the crop, and the fields to be autumn sown, which does not benefit wildlife.  Farmers are grant aided to use the former, traditional method, and to not use any form of chemical input (artificial fertilizer, herbicide, etc.) which will encourage declining arable "weeds" like the corn marigold.

Demand these days is for food produced in such a traditional way, particularly where it contributes to the conservation of important habitats and species, as outlined above.  It is hoped therefore that a return to traditional farming will become economically viable for farmers, with their produce being sold at a premium.  It is therefore possible for the countryside to be managed in a sustainable way which benefits wildlife, which secures a future for our farmers and which produces healthy food and a rich landscape for everyone to enjoy.

Photograph © Philip Clarke