The home of Britain's Working Conservationists
A landmark event coordinated by the GWCT, the Moorland Association and Fitzwilliam Wentworth Estate has brought together, for the first time, the people and organisations responsible for managing England’s protected uplands to seek a common vision for the future of these precious landscapes.
Within properly functioning ecosystems, deer play an important role by maintaining open areas, which can enhance the biodiversity and habitat quality of a woodland. However, without numbers being correctly controlled, large deer populations can have a devastating effect on their environment.
Grouse moors appear to form important refuges for breeding merlin. However, recent merlin declines have been suggested to be due to intensified cutting and burning of heather to favour grouse, thereby reducing both the availability of tall heather for nesting and the numbers of small birds, particularly meadow pipits.
This February and March the Farmland Ecology Unit collected 1,200 soil samples as part of the healthy soil, healthy food, and healthy people (H3) project. H3 is part of a large interdisciplinary project aiming to transform UK food systems by putting the health of people and the environment at the forefront of UK food production.
The Owl Box Initiative project carries out a range of monitoring activities to understand more about local barn owl populations and their use of habitat.
Ahead of the expected publication of the UK’s first National Food Strategy for 70 years, a high-level group of political, scientific and industry leaders is urging the Government to do much more to put scientific rigour and evidence at the heart of Britain’s food and farming policies, warning that a failure to do so could risk sleepwalking the nation into its own food crisis.
Sussex farmers and farm advisors have an opportunity to learn more about the habitat management and conservation techniques that have achieved remarkable farmland wildlife restoration on a tour of Peppering Farm on 10 June.
Every year, there is a day dedicated by the United Nations to raising awareness of the importance of biodiversity across the world. This is the International Day for Biological Diversity (IDB for short), which is held on 22nd May.
The results are in for the 2022 GWCT Big Farmland Bird Count. More than 1,900 farmers and land managers overcame challenging conditions to provide a vital snapshot of the health of our cherished farmland birds by taking part in the count, between 4-20 February.
The GWCT is assisting with an exciting new project initiated by the Norfolk Estate, Sussex, to establish a breeding curlew population on the South Downs. The project involves a technique called headstarting, whereby eggs are taken from the wild (under licence), incubated artificially, and then chicks are reared to fledging age in enclosures before release into the wild.