Nedging Hall Estate reaches Final Four in the Nature Friendly Farm Award in the inaugural Schoffel Countryside Awards

Nedging Hall Estate is a family-owned country estate, covering 5,000 acres deep in the beautiful Suffolk countryside, between Bury St Edmunds and Ipswich. Nedging Hall sits in the middle of the mixed farmland and has focused on reintroducing ancient woodland areas, hedgerows and ponds.

The estate has just reached the final four in the Nature Friendly Farm Award in the inaugural Schoffel Countryside Awards. Sustainability and environmental impact are at the forefront of the Nedging Hall Estate mindset. They have created a long-term management vision to develop a thriving hub of biodiversity and it’s wonderful for them to be recognised nationally.

Long term Management

The Buckle family is committed to woodland creation and management. They have added a remarkable 25 hectares of new woodland between 2020 and 2023, equating to a total of 45,000 young trees. Richard Adams runs the tree planting and pond digging with Juliet Hawkins (a Conservational advisor). Juliet is one of the country’s leading pond ecologists and pond historians. In 2022 Juliet surveyed the flora and fauna and the general state of all the farm ponds, building on her previous work on the farm between 2006 and 2012. Her findings provided direction for restoration of some of the 44 ponds identified on the farm and have been shared with Suffolk Biological Information Service.

Sustainable Farming

Around 3,500 acres of the estate are used for growing combinable crops, through a joint venture between Heathpatch, A J Pratt & Sons and W D Chaplin Farms, via Brett Vale Farming Company Limited.  The joint venture combines years of knowledge, expertise and machinery to provide high quality contract farming services to the shareholders’ land and their clients. Crops currently grown include wheat, barley, beans, oilseed rape, sugar beet, maize and rye. The majority of the arable fields have environmental stewardship margins planted to encourage wild birds, wildflowers and insects.

Hospitality working hand in hand with the farm

The countryside of Suffolk is something they feel incredibly proud of and want to look after for generations to come.  They are on a mission to preserve British hospitality and pubs—an endeavour that gained significance as more than 383 pubs closed in 2023. The hospitality branch of the business is key. The Crown in Bildeston; an award-winning pub with rooms focussing on estate-to-plate dining, The Lindsey Rose; a Suffolk country pub, Nedging Hall; an exclusive-use country house and Mauldons Brewery. The businesses work full circle, are inextricably linked and look after each other; that’s key to them. We use malting barley grown on our own farm to craft the ales that go into our Suffolk pubs, The Lindsey Rose and The Bildeston Crown.

Charles Buckle, Managing Director of Nedging Hall Estate commented: “As a family farm, we’ve always believed that good farming and respect for the countryside go hand in hand. Over the years we’ve focused on improving soil health, planting new woodlands, restoring ponds and other habitats, and creating wildlife corridors right across the estate.  It’s been a real team effort, with everyone at Nedging Hall Estate and Brett Vale Farming sharing the same goal of leaving the land in better shape for future generations.  We’ve worked hard to create a landscape where productive farming and caring about biodiversity go hand in hand.  We’re really proud of what has been achieved so far, and it’s lovely to see that effort being recognised.”