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Try reading the first sentence of my original post again because that answers your question. For the record neolithic man cleared the Downs of trees, there then followed many centuries of arable farming before the lure of wealth in the 13th century saw the peasants kicked off and replaced by...

Indeed and the reason why man was turfed off the Downs in the 13th and 14th centuries and replaced by sheep was the huge amounts off cash to be made by landlords and the crown by the selling of fleeces to feed the lucrative cloth industry in Flanders.

Fair enough, thought you were talking about whacking any old turf down.

Except it doesn't work like that, the whole process of maintaining chalk grassland involves long periods of sheep grazing and removing certain invasive scrub plants, you don't just lay a piece of turf. The original chalk grassland was maintained from the 13th century onwards by huge flocks of...