It’s found on every continent except for Antarctica and is one of the commonest plants in the entire world. Perhaps that’s why bracken is not universally loved, renowned as it is for taking over British hillsides in dense swathes that crowd out wildflowers and other flora.
But now scientists and farmers are trialling a new method to control – though not completely eliminate – this ubiquitous plant: livestock, and cattle especially.
Katharine Pinfold, who farms sheep and cattle across 400 hectares in Loweswater in the Lake District is one of them. “Bracken is a bit of a monoculture, it spreads and takes over, choking out other vegetation, including grass for grazing animals,” she says. "Animals don’t eat bracken and once it takes hold, there is nothing for them to eat.”
Previously, farmers were able to use a herbicide called Asulox, under annual emergency authorisations, to knock bracken back, but in 2023 this became unavailable.
So, Pinfold, along with seven other farmers in the north of England, is trialling a method whereby they place salt licks or hay among the bracken to encourage cattle (on her farm, belted Galloways) to go into the foliage.
“Cattle trample and squash the bracken and weaken it,” she says. “Already we can see areas where they have opened up paths through it and that the bracken is smaller and thinner than it was previously.”
Bracken does have benefits for wildlife, providing nesting space for tree and meadow pipits and nightjars, for example, but knocking it back allows wildflowers and other flora to gain a foothold with corresponding benefits for invertebrates.
In particular, it’s hoped this will allow plants such as dog violets to thrive because these are the larval food plants for rare butterflies such as the high brown and small pearl-bordered fritillaries.
Tabitha Acton, who is a farming advisor for the Soil Association’s Innovative Farmers project, says the trial began running in May of this year and has funding to continue until 2027.
“It won’t work for everyone,” she says, “but it’s good for upland farmers with native breeds that can be left out on the hill over the winter. It wouldn’t be something you do with continental beef cattle.”
One farm in Northumberland hopes to use pigs as well as cattle. It’s thought they might have an even greater impact because they dig up the bracken rhizomes as they rootle around in the soil.
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