The farm.

Much of the land at Higher Plot is designated a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) It is rare unimproved limestone grassland that has never had any form of chemical fertiliser or herbicide applied and so has a huge range of grasses and wild flowers. We manage it to encourage a wide range of flora and fauna to the extent that when it was originally surveyed, the land was said to have the widest bio-diversity to be found in Somerset. There are more than 20 butterfly species and rare orchids including Bee, Pyramidal and White Hellebore. The orchard is hundreds of years old and lies on terracing that are possibly Roman or more likely, Saxon Lynchetts and so more than 1000 years old. We work by replacing trees and grazing the land with sheep from Pitney Farm.

The Full Citation is -

SITE NOTIFIED TO THE SECRETARY OF STATE ON 6 JUNE 1988 COUNTY: SOMERSET SITE NAME: ALLER HILL 

• Description and Reasons for Notification: Aller Hill comprises three discrete blocks of herb-rich calcareous grassland and associated woodland and scrub. The site contains three species of plant which are nationally rare and a further three which are of restricted distribution in Somerset. The site covers a steep, south facing scarp slope of Rhaetic clays, capped on the plateau by liassic clays and limestone which overlies Keuper marls from the Trias. These parent rocks produce well drained calcareous clayey soils of the Sherborne series and shallow, slowly permeable soils of the Worcester series. Variation within the grassland component of the site is largely a product of different management practices. The central area contains a sward dominated by Sheep’s fescue Festuca ovina in combination with Yellow Oat-grass Trisetum flavescens and Quaking-grass Briza media. The range of species present are characteristic of traditionally managed calcareous grassland with extensive areas of Common Bird'sfoot trefoil Lotus corniculatus, Lady’s-Bedstraw Galium verum and Wild Thyme Thymus praecox forming a mosaic within the sward. Large populations of Pyramidal Orchid Anacamptis pyramidalis occur with Bee Orchid Ophrys apifera, Yellow-wort Blackstonia perfoliata and Woolly Thistle Cirsium eriophorum. Scrub encroachment on the grassland blocks to the east and west has encouraged large rabbit populations. Their locally intensive grazing has kept open small, tightly grazed glades. Salad Burnet Sanguisorba minor forms a major component of the sward with Rough Marsh-mallow Althaea hirsuta and Nit-grass Gastridium ventricosum, two nationally rare species, also present. Several plants with a restricted distribution in Somerset also occur here including Wild Liquorice Astragalus glycyphyllos, Fiddle Dock Rumex pulcher and Lesser Centaury Centaurium pulchellum. Woodland at the extreme west of the site is dominated by Ash Fraxinus excelsior with abundant Sycamore Acer pseudoplatanus. Rough Chervil Chaerophyllum temulentum occupies much of the field layer with the nationally rare Purple Gromwell Lithospermum purpurocaeruleum occurring here.