IN DECEMBER 2021, A COMPANY CALLED Nattergal, headed by Neil Perry, a former director of Barings and Solarcentury, made a successful bid for the 617-hectare Boothby Lodge Farm in south Lincolnshire. It looked a savvy purchase. The land is Grade 3, chalky till, limestone and clay.
Savills, the selling agents, highlighted the previous owner’s “exceptional soil husbandry”. Tests conducted every four years allowed for variable nutrient applications across the holding. The yields from the rotation of oilseed rape, spring barley, winter wheat, linseed and beans, are above average. Until the time of sale, the farm was in a countryside stewardship scheme: wild bird seed mixes and cover featured over part of the land; there were 12.89 hectares of permanent meadowland and semi-permanent pasture. The farm’s 21.5 hectares of woodland were well managed by a small pheasant shoot. In all, Boothby Lodge is just the “right” sort of farm to buy. Big enough to be financially viable, sufficiently fecund to be productive,
