A vital part of our environment, our farmlands are also an important visual amenity and contribute to healthy living and economic diversification. The Trust leases out about 32 acres of arable land all over the Island to commercial farmers.
For security reasons, these properties are not open to the public.
Location: Middle Road, Devonshire
Locust Hall Farm, 24 acres comprising 12 acres of working farmland and an equal amount of woodland, is one of the largest farms in Bermuda. The fields, which are large by Bermuda standards, offer a glimpse of an earlier, rural Bermuda. They are farmed for vegetables and flowers by the Pacheco family. The property also has two cottages and a small Victorian house. An old Bermuda drystone wall on the southern boundary of the property runs under the shade of an Allspice forest and is covered by the very rare Long Spleenwort Fern.
Edmund Gibbons bought the property in 1970 to protect it from development and in 1989 his three children gave 19 acres to the Trust with the proviso that the arable land be retained as a working farm and that the remaining land be retained as open space. The remaining five acres were later purchased by the Trust.
Location: South Road, Devonshire
Devondale is the largest of the old houses along South Road, Devonshire. This beautiful late 18th century Grade II listed house and 10 acres of woodland and farmland was transferred to the ownership of the Bermuda National Trust from the estate of Mrs Jean Cox Spence who died in June 2012.
By bequeathing this property to the National Trust, Mrs Spence reconnected under single ownership two large Devonshire estates (Devondale and Locust Hall) that were once both owned by her family before being divided in 1857. Mrs Spence’s legacy creates a 34-acre rural tract of land stretching from South Road to Middle Road, Devonshire. Under the National Trust’s ownership this land will be preserved for the benefit of Bermuda forever.
Location: Mullet Bay Road, St. George’s
Nea Smith, a long-time supporter of the National Trust, gave half her interest in this 8 acre property to the Trust and with it came the proud farming tradition of her family. Her father Reeve Smith and uncle Howard Smith had originally farmed together in St. David’s, but they were relocated by the Government when the aiport was built. Howard was famous for the cultivation of Easter lilies, and is remembered as the man who developed the early – blooming Easter Lily that is named after him, Lillium howardii.
In 1941, Reeve Smith purchased Stokes Point Farm from the Government. Over the years, Stokes Point Farm has produced potatoes, onions, celery and Easter lilies for the New York market.
The property reaches the coastline on both sides, being bounded by a sizable mangrove swamp at Ferry Reach and by Mullet Bay on the other side. The neighbouring two acres were acquired in 1980 by the Bermuda Audubon Society, which excavated and landscaped Bartram’s Pond, opening the property as a nature reserve in 1985.
Location: South Road, Paget
Adjoining Paget Marsh is a small cottage and farmland that has been farmed for more than 100 years. As well as arable fields, there is a banana patch and fruit trees. The land was purchased in 1965 by the Historical Monuments Trust, predecessor to the Bermuda National Trust, which already owned two parcels of land at Paget Marsh.