Farming on the Sompting downs - past, present, future

The four old Sompting manors, Sompting Farm or Abbotts, Lychpole, Peverel, and Cokeham, ran from near the coast up to the downland heights, so as to include a good mixture of farmland types.

This is still true of the Sompting Estate. Sheep and cattle are raised in a patchwork of arable rotational crops and grassland. This mixture supports both sustainable farming and an amazing variety of wildlife. The downland farms of the Sompting Estate are called Lychpole Farm and Upton Farm.

Traditional farming systems
For centuries there was mixed farming on the Sompting downs. Some slopes were permanent flower-rich pasture, and some were in arable. The arable land would by turns have cereal or brassica crops or temporary grass leys. The grazing sheep and cows were important not only for their wool meat and milk, but also because their dung naturally fertilized the arable ground. For more information about farming and countryside history click here.

Twentieth century changes
After World War Two, it was so important to feed the hungry nation that much more of the downland was ploughed up. Artificial fertilizers and pesticides allowed continuous production of winter wheat without need of animals. Upton Farm had fewer cattle than before, and hardly any sheep but for a small Southdown Sheep breeding flock. Lychpole was without animals altogether. The farms achieved the big output increases that were demanded, but was it sustainable? And what was happening to the downland wildlife?

Farming both for Food and for the Environment
A new approach was developed, to make the business of farming for the environment pay, alongside the business of producing food. For more information about farming today across the UK, click here.

From about 1980 onwards, the Sompting Estate owners had already begun a program of conservation measures to protect and enhance valued downland habitats such as species-rich chalk grassland. From about 2000 onwards, together with new farm tenants they restored a more traditional system of sheep and cattle grazing to the Sompting downs, first with re-sown grasslands at Upton and then at Lychpole from 2007 restoring grasslands alongside mixed rotational arable including spring barley and feed crops.

The result of these changes is that the soil is improved, insects and birds thrive, and the whole system is more self-sustaining, with animal feed crops as well as food crops being grown on the farms. Land management keeps changing in response to – for example - the weather, soil condition, the market for meat and for crops, the needs of the wildlife and the other people who have an interest in the land. In response to the results that have now been achieved at Lychpole, a more diverse system will also be developed at Upton in the coming years.

This landscape and environment management system depends on livestock farming being profitable, so if you love the grassy downland, eat local meat and be prepared to pay a fair price for it!