£264.00
info Summary
This Countryside Stewardship option provides £264 per hectare per year for the management of traditional orchards, aiming to maintain healthy young and mature fruit trees, restore tree numbers, and enhance biodiversity through appropriate grassland and scrub management. It supports the restoration of traditional orchards, promoting a rich habitat for invertebrates, birds, and wildflowers.
format_list_bulleted What to do
- Manage traditional orchards to provide a range of healthy young and mature fruit trees.
- Restore tree numbers by planting fruit trees on vigorous root stock, formatively pruning new trees, and keeping their base free of vegetation for at least three years.
- Protect all trees from livestock and wild animals, and keep all mature and over-mature trees, standing deadwood, and deadwood on living trees.
- Manage grass by grazing or cutting for hay, allowing some to go to seed during autumn and winter.
- Manage scrub to ensure a minimum presence and control invasive species.
- Do not plough, cultivate, re-seed, roll, harrow, apply fertilisers, manures, or lime.
- Do not carry out supplementary feeding or drainage works without RPA permission.
- Do not use pesticides (except for spot-treating/weed-wiping specific weeds) or fungicides without Natural England approval.
schedule When to do
- From 1 September to 28 February, allow 5 to 10% of the total area to support grasses that have gone to seed, with the seed heads left undisturbed.
checklist How to do
- Manage grassland by grazing or hay cutting.
- Maintain characteristic tree form through pruning and restore tree numbers.
- Protect trees from livestock damage and keep all mature, over-mature, standing deadwood, and deadwood on living trees.
- Control scrub and invasive species.
- From 1 September to 28 February, allow 5 to 10% of the area to support grasses that have gone to seed, leaving seed heads undisturbed.
- Keep a 1m diameter circle around newly planted trees clear of vegetation for at least 3 years.
- Manage tree guards to prevent damage.
description Evidence Required
Where there is uncertainty about whether the aims of the options have been delivered, we will take into account any records or evidence you may have kept demonstrating delivery of the aims of the option. This will include any steps you’ve taken to follow the recommended management set out above. It’s your responsibility to keep such records if you want to rely on these to support your claim.
- Receipted invoices, consents or permissions connected with any work
- Records of all management activity on the option area for each parcel
- Dates and locations of formative or maintenance pruning carried out for each parcel
- A base map or table showing the location, species, rootstock, variety and age class of trees present in each parcel
- A monthly record of stock numbers grazing each parcel
- Photographs of trees entered into the option and cut areas of scrub
- If managing by hay cutting, photographs of the areas cut and uncut in each parcel
tips_and_updates Additional Advice
- Traditional orchards are defined as fruit and nut trees on vigorous rootstocks at low densities in permanent grassland, managed low-intensity.
- Prevent weeds from competing with newly planted trees by keeping a 1m diameter circle clear of vegetation for at least the first 3 years after planting.
- This option is beneficial for biodiversity, and habitat options should be linked wherever possible to improve connectivity for wildlife.
View Official Guidelines
Access detailed information about this action on the RPA website