1.
2016 is the year of the Capability Brown Festival. Here’s the website where you can find out more about Brown, his sites and festival events - some of them academic and research based, others irreverant youth and arts based activities to encourage a wider range of people to get interested and visit our historic parklands.
About Brown
born 300 years ago advised on the design of over 250 historic landscapes 170 survive
account books show his clients included royalty and half the House of Lords one of the few landscape designers today we known by name –

2. Before Brown the fashion was for formal landscapes influenced by the French style with ordered geometric gardens and water bodies around the main house with avenues of trees and channelled vistas.
Brown helped develop a more naturalistic style known as the English Landscape movement - emulate rather than dominate nature.
He created
natural looking landscapes on a large scale with bare lawns and parkland with serpentine lakes and informal parkland trees and woodland with the planting to shape spaces and frame views.
His parkland appear seamless with subtle ground modelling in places to create smooth parkland and use of sunken fences or ha-has so there appeared to be no separation between the grazed parkland when viewed from the main house and lawns.
He created extensive ridings and carriage routes around the landscape to produce a variety of experiences to surprise and delight with
views to eye catcher features within the estate and borrowed views in the wider landscape.

4. We don’t have a good an understanding of what Brown did at each site to create his landscapes - it varied according to the site– this is the man that knows most so if you have any questions about Brown ask him.
At some he removed formal gardens and tree avenues, at others the formal landscape had already been removed.
He conserved existing trees now ancient trees and planted hundreds of parkland trees now veterans as well as extensive woodland.
Through large scale ground works and drainage he removed natural wetland systems and wet grasslands and created open water bodies and new grasslands in their place.
He expanded parklands to incorporate features including grazed common land and medieval deer parks and arable land in the wider landscape in the process conserving them from subsequent development or agriculture.
Often his natural style landscapes provided a more varied habitat than the formal manicured gardens and arable land he replaced.

5. Longleat Brown extensive landscape
Sunken fence at Moccas and eyecatcher at Highclere above the lake
Research
To find out more about Brown, as part of the CB2016 Festival Natural England carried out some research that concluded that Browns landscapes and historic designed landscapes generally are an undervalued resource in terms of their biodiversity and wider environmental benefits.

6. Ecological value of Brown sites
Occurring in Brown sites
at more than double the density
compared to the surrounding landscape
A study of 130 Brown sites across England showed that they collectively have 12 of the 18 priority BAP habitats within them.
5 BAP priority habitats occur nationally at more than double the density in them compared to the surrounding landscapes:
Wood pasture and parkland, Deciduous woodland, Lowland heath, Undetermined grassland, Reed beds.
The same goes for ancient and related ancient woodland and surface water bodies
Also SSSIs also occur nationally at more than double the density in them compared to the landscapes that surround them
Wood pasture and parkland habitat is 30 times denser in Brown sites nationally compared to the landscape as a whole, with deciduous woodland and lowland heath also being significant.
BAP habitats other than wood pasture and parkland are 2.4 times denser nationally within Brown sites compared to the landscape as a whole, a significant difference.
Wood pasture and parkland 57%:0.5%
Deciduous woodland %:5;5%
Lowland heath %:0.5%
Undetermined grassland %:0.2%
Reed beds %:0.1%
Ancient woodland %: 2.2%
Replanted ancient woodland %:1.7%
Surface water %:1.0%
Sites of Special Scientific Interest
11%: 5%

7. Contribution of Brown sites to ecological connectivity
Habitats and species studied according to condition and distribution of comparable predominant habitats and ability of species associated with them to move or be moved:
Croome - ponds grassland, Great Crested Newt, Lesser Horseshoe Bat
Moccas - veteran trees, lake, deadwood invertebrates, Greater Bladderwort
Syon - tidal meadows, wood pasture, German Hairy Snail, bats
Wrest - water margins, broad leaved woodland, Dragonflies and damselflies, bats
Highclere - ancient replanted broadleaved woodland, unimproved grassland, Dormouse, Duke of Burgundy butterfly
Connectivity
Analysis of 5 Brown sites key habitats and associated species demonstrated that ecological connectivity within them is generally high. The parkland features Brown incorporated into his designs : grassland, parkland trees, woodland, water bodies and built structures arranged in an intricate pattern has created a mosaic of complementary habitats with lengthy edge habitat which is important to may species.
Connectivity to the wider landscape is generally not as strong and variable.
Brown sites are oasis of biodiversity, particularly important for habitats and species requiring long term management continuity and associated with wood pasture, dead-wood, ancient woodland, deciduous woodland, grassland, lowland heath and open water.
The frequency of Brown parklands across England, together with other parklands and areas of wood pasture means they can provide stepping stones for species to connect with similar habitats in the wider landscape, strengthening ecological resilience. Brown’s parklands are oases for wildlife, supporting and conserving within them more than double the density of wildlife habitats nationally compared to landscapes as a whole, and are

8. Contribution of Brown sites to Ecosystem Services
Ecosystem system services
We looked at Brown’s landscapes from a wider perspective using the ecosystem services approach which looks at the the multiple benefits the natural environment provides that benefit our health and wellbeing. It helps guide integrated management tso they continue to be relevant in the 21st century.
This is a quick summary but more info SH papers.
This table shows that parkland features contribute to a wide range of ecosystem services in particular genetic diversity, regulation of climate, regulation of water quality and water flow, our sense of history and place and biodiversity.
So ancient and veteran trees contribute to genetic diversity because they are pure native tree strains dating back to the medieval period and beyond, providing a seedbank for restoring wood pasture habitat as well as strains that may be resistant to disease and climatic variation. They regulate climate by absorbing and storing carbon and cooling. They regulate water flow and reduce flooding by their take up of water and slowing down run off.
They have european significance for their wildlife value and for the rare species they support associated with decaying wood, notably fungi, lichens and invertebrates as well as for providing roosts for bats. They are remnants of the country’s wild wood origins and its wood pasture habitat mosaic. They provide habitat continuity for a wide range of species, many of them very rare, without which they would die out.
They connect us with historical events and ritual, they provide a sense of ancientness, mystery and inspiration that is beneficial to our health and well being.

9. So far example at Syon, Greater London, Brown made the river a focus of the landscape, pioneering views to and across the river as a new way to appreciate the ‘natural’ landscape.
The parkland contributes to flood management providing temporary water storage to reduce the threat of flooding the surrounding urban area. It is part of the urban network of greenspaces providing opportunities for health and recreation and one of the few places in Greater London people can see cattle grazing and over wintering snipe.
The parkland is the only area with tidal meadows on the Thames in Greater London with mudflats and natural banks designated Syon Park SSSI supporting a wide variety of habitats and species, some of them very rare including the rare German hairy snail.
Ancient trees and woodland are important for roosting sites for bats that use the River Thames for foraging and as a wildlife corridor connecting with other sites, including parklands along the river, and its tributaries as well as the nearby Richmond Park. The species rich parkland grassland is managed as rough wood pasture away from the publically accessible areas, mainly the lawns around the house by and dead and decaying wood is retained.

10. As part of the CB300 festival we came up with the idea of running a design competition. We wanted a project that would demonstrate how a Brown landscape could be designed for the 21st century. Something he might have designed if he were alive today, sensitive to nature conservation and management of land for a wide range of purposes.
Saul is going to talk to you about Mocas Park and how the design competition influenced a restoration scheme there.