Hardwick Park Farm - Land Stewardship

Hardwick Park Farm is situated on the Hardwick Hall estate, east of Chesterfield on the Derbyshire – Nottinghamshire country border. The National Trust has owned the farm and estate since 1959.

The farm comprises of 234 hectares, made up of the agricultural land of the registered parkland (i.e. excluding the woodland and pond areas). The parkland is registered as Grade 1 on the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens.

Until recently the farm was managed as a mixed grassland and arable farm. The western part of the Park was designated a Country Park in 1977 and as such has enjoyed considerable amounts of public access. The eastern part of the park was not accessible to the public.

In October 2003 the farm entered a Countryside Stewardship Scheme agreement designated to restore the parkland and create further open access.

The main elements of the restoration work are

• The reversion of all the arable land to grassland,
• Management of the previous grassland and new grassland under conservation management,
• Removal of fences to recreate open vistas across the Park and planting of additional trees.

Open access has been created across the eastern part of the Park (except those immediately adjacent to the farmstead) with the creation of ‘Lady Spencers Walk’ to create circular park access for visitors to see the restoration work.

Rare breeds in the form of Longhorn Cattle and Whitefaced Woodland Sheep have been reintroduced to the parkland recently and it is hoped to expand the numbers of rare breed livestock on the farm.