Blog (Wildlife) - Visit The New Forest

When walking, cycling, horse riding, driving or just relaxing in the New Forest, we all need to be aware of it’s special needs and particularly help keep our free-roaming animals and all of our other wonderful wildlife safe and protected

The magical New Forest is famous for its roaming ponies and donkeys. But what about our fallow deer? Or our shy smooth snakes? If you’d like to treat yourself or the children to a close encounter with some of the UK’s rarest creatures, the New Forest is the place to come.

If you want to see something that is off-the-scale adorable, make time to visit the magical New Forest for a few days or hours over the next couple of months. Now is the best time to catch the enchanting new foals, baby donkeys, calves and fawns as they wobble and skip through the newly-awakening woodlands and heaths.

The longest, darkest winter is over and Spring is finally here! There’s no better way to make the most of the brighter, warmer days than with a walk (and maybe a picnic, too!) in the magical New Forest.

As the temperatures drop and the days shorten, the trees in the magical New Forest explode with colour; from brilliant scarlet to bright gold, hot pink to flaming orange. Then there’s the heathlands; bursting with purple heather and the flare of the gorse.

For 2020, pannage in the New Forest begins on Monday 14th September and has been extended to 21 December!

Leaf Peeping is the lovely American term for the very agreeable pastime of travelling to photograph and marvel over Nature’s Fireworks – when the solid green tree canopy becomes a wonderland of colour as its leaves turn scarlet, orange and gold.

One of the best sights of the New Forest in the summer is the spectacular, vibrant heather sweeping across our vast heathlands! The three types of heather in the New Forest provide a beautiful purple and pink carpet across the forest floors from start/mid August to mid September.

Now that lockdown is easing, you'll want to come and visit the magical New Forest. We need our lovely visitors to keep to a few guidelines to ensure everyone and everything can stay safe.

We know this is a difficult time, and the fact you can’t visit the New Forest to see our gorgeous spring wildlife might be making it even harder for you, so we thought we’d give you a little update on our spring wildlife that you can look at and enjoy from your own home.