Top wildlife walks

Calke Park and Abbey, Derbyshire

Visitors to Calke can enjoy a peaceful walk through secret walled gardens and 600 acres of parkland. The landscape includes a rare habitat called ‘wood pasture’ which consists of open, structured woodland surrounded by grasslands filled with wildflowers and fungi. The area has some of the oldest trees in Europe, including an oak known as ‘The old man of Calke’ that is over 1,000 years old. The trees also provide nesting sites for woodland birds such as the nuthatch, tree creeper and great spotted and green woodpeckers.

There are many mammals to see in the varied habitats across Calke’s fertile landscape. Field voles, shrews and wood mice inhabit in the grasslands, and although these may be hard to spot, you might be lucky enough to see a weasel or a stoat. Look out for badger tracks on the woodland floor and fallow deer locking horns during the autumn. Calke is also a great place to see bats, with over half of the UK’s 16 species recorded there, including the Serotine bat, a rare visitor to the area.

Click here for details of this National Trust walk

Photo: The South Front with the Greek Revival portico of Calke Abbey from the Park. © NTPL/Rupert Truman

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