The glorious parkland landscape setting of Ards Friary owes its recent history to the Anglo-Irish Stewart family who created and maintained this magnificent parkland landscape, and stocked it with broadleaved trees, in the early 19th century. More recently the surrounding landscape has been declared a Special Area of Conservation (Sheephaven Bay SAC, 2014) in order to protect the unique habitats of mudflats, salt meadows, shifting dunes, machair grasslands and old oak woodlands. The ancient oaks that grow along the shoreline and in the woods of Ards merit our renewed notice and protection.