Mark Gammon gave us a very enlightening talk about the forest verderers. How they came about, their role in the forest and how It has evolved. The verderers, from the French word vert meaning green, were first appointed in 1079 by William the Conquerer to look after the royal hunting ground he had designated the New Forest.

The King wanted to hunt deer in the forest and the deer needed food. The verderers made sure there was enough food to sustain the deer population they managed the agisters to provide and look after the deer as well as to protect them from being stolen by the forest population. In order to make this run smoothly a verderers court was established. This court still sits every first Wednesday of the Month to manage forest business. It is the second oldest court in the country after the coroners court. The court has full powers to judge and mete out punishment to offenders in the forest.

There are 10 verderers that make up the court. 5 are appointed by commoners and 5 appointed by forest bodies like the National Park, Forestry England etc. They manage the commoners rights and disputes arising.

There are 600 commoners eligible to vote, those who live on land with commoners’ rights and who have at least an acre of land to be able to accommodate their stock if the forest needs to be cleared of animals due to lack of grazing or disease. They vote to appoint the verderers in regular elections run by NFDC.

Mark told us there are approximately 5000 ponies, 2000 cattle, variable numbers of pigs depending on the mast and acorns available to sustain them and 120 donkeys. The main role of the verderers now is to make sure the ecosystem can support the animals and that the animals are looked after and managed in a good way.

It was interesting that Adrian Butterworth who gave the vote of thanks knew Mark for 45 years. Mark had joined Adrians Solicitor practice as an articled clerk and gone on to have a successful career in the Crown Prosecution service.