What is 'Shotover' ?Many Oxford people today think of 'Shotover' as being the Country Park, incorporating Shotover Hill and Brasenose Woods. Shotover has been part of local peoples' lives for two millenia, and nowadays draws in some 600,000 visitors a year. To some extent that is correct. However, the whole of the Hill, whose flat summit rises to an altitude of 171 metres, covers about 4 square kilometres; it includes many agricultural fields and residential plots as well as the Country Park established in 1974. The slopes of this beautiful hill have been settled since the Roman times, and from Saxon times until the Civil War it was part of a Royal Forest. The oaks from Brasenose Wood on the south-west side have traditionally provided timber for Oxford's historic buildings, and for centuries the coppice woodland has been used locally for fencing, sheep hurdles and fuel. On the south side is the village of Horspath, active since before 1066, and on the east the landscaped parkland of the Shotover Estate, developed around Shotover House since 1718. It has been designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest since 1986.Today Shotover Country Park is still a wild and beautiful place where anyone can go for informal recreation, to enjoy the great variety of grassland, heathland, woodlands, and wetlands, or to study the wildlife which includes 27 species of mammals ranging from voles to deer, three of Britain's indigenous reptiles, all three species of British newts, five species of bats, 28 different species of butterflies, over 100 species of birds, nearly 200 different moths, and hundreds of other insects which provide living proof that this place is virtually free from pollution. Some of the land in the Country Park is still owned by the University, but it is now all managed by Oxford City Council's Countryside Service. As further protection against development, the City of Oxford has undertaken to preserve its own farmland on the south side of the hill 'in its natural state' as a condition of receiving a large gift of land from the Oxford Preservation Trust into the Country Park. With such a long history of local community involvement, Shotover deserves an assured place in the lives of future generations, but this will not be achieved by complacency or neglect. Preservation.Preserving what? - Not the woodland with the wild cats, boars, wolves and reindeer which disappeared in Roman times. Not the long barrow already flattened by World War II tank manoeuvres. Not as a Saxon hunting forest, nor as a golf course or a centre for any other formal sports. But Shotover does need preservation, with its great variety of landscape and distinctive flora and fauna, not only for its scientific value, but also because of its accessibility by very large numbers of people from all over Oxford. They use this quiet and beautiful place for relaxation, recreation and education. The challenge is to preserve the character of Shotover and to respond to the need for increased public access to it.Shotover needs preservation now because it faces a variety of new threats, partly because of its own popularity, and partly because it is clearly a constantly evolving place, where preservation has succeeded only through flexible conservation practices coupled with wise strategic planning. A large proportion of visitors now arrive by car, and this in itself is a problem for the future. These large numbers of visitors are eroding those paths nearest the car park, and this becomes another management problem, along with the other problems of access for horse-riders, cyclists, and disabled people. Toilets are now required. There is great pressure to develop the surrounding land for more housing, and there is also the constant risk that too much well-intentioned management and manicuring of the Park in the style of a municipal park may effectively destroy its natural wildness by means just as powerful as suburbanisation. The public needs to advise the Council. No one has the monopoly of wisdom and insight into the future to know which policies and conservation solutions will be best in the long-term, so there is need for continuous public debate amongst all the users of Shotover and those responsible for its management, to identify problems before they become insoluble. We must develop a strategy based upon the least intrusive solutions to these problems, and one which will allow Shotover to be enjoyed by many future generations. This has always been a primary aim of the Society. The Society.Recognising that the natural wildness of the hill was at risk after its designation as a Country Park, a large protest group representing a wide spectrum of Oxford people with a love of Shotover founded the Society in 1974, with the wide remit to "consider all matters which are likely to affect Shotover and make recommendations to the appropriate bodies on this, and on any ways of enhancing the public's continued enjoyment of Shotover." The Society today is not so much a protest group - unless a particular threat to Shotover appears on the horizon to mobilise its members for a specific campaign - but is more part of an information network, which gathers together all kinds of local people who want to preserve Shotover, and links them to other supportive conservation organisations, local councils, and other environmental specialists who freely offer their advice to the Society. The Committee meets several times a year to monitor and respond to any known threats to the environment of Shotover, including planning applications for any changes of land use nearby, and a Newsletter is distributed to all members twice a year.The Society has produced environmental impact surveys, and specialist witnesses at Planning Inquiries, Visitor Surveys, aerial photographic surveys, and other advice and information for the Countryside Service. It is committed to supporting a wider Shotover Advisory Group to provide a news network for all the many different groups of people who have a genuine interest in enjoying Shotover. Our aim is to preserve it for future generations to do the same. We are now compiling a list of these people who can also be contacted quickly by Internet. Membership fees are kept low, just sufficient to cover the cost of the Newsletters, and the Society holds its AGM each summer, usually at Shotover House, where a lively debate amongst Members often serves to expose new information on current issues. Preservation today does not imply locking Shotover into an 18th or 19th century 'time-warp'. But it does need as many talented people as possible to contribute their observations, ideas, and skills to solve the development problems as they arise, and occasionally to help with some practical work. One practical project for the coming year is to develop one of Sir John Miller's set-aside fields on the north side of the hill as a wildlife reserve. This is a particularly interesting and secluded field which has a spinney, blackberry bushes and gorse, some grassland, and some wetland, and is used by frogs and toads, rabbits and foxes, a stoat and a badger, and a great variety of birds. Another project is to devise a method for monitoring the Reeves Muntjac Deer which are regular visitors to Shotover but are very shy of any human contact. This Society is not shy and welcomes anyone to join who enjoys Shotover and wants to help preserve it. Contacts
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