About the 26 Network for Nature projects

Wildlife Trust for Beds, Cambs & Northants: Four-year project, working on Nene Valley nature reserves to create scrapes, a sand martin bank and better wetlands for water birds. Also improve floodplain capacity and carbon storage. Highland cattle will enhance conservation grazing creating wildlife habitat. Nene Valley SSSI complex extends approx. 35 km and is bordered among much of its length by the A45.

Wildlife Trust for Beds, Cambs & Northants – Blows Down: The project will improve conservation grazing and help chalkhill blue, small blue and brown argus butterflies by creating chalk scrapes and with more and a better range of wildflowers, including horseshoe vetch, common rock-rose and kidney vetch, food plants for these butterflies. Monitoring and surveying for slow worms and birds. There will be new carved benches with wildlife information for visitors who visit this highly popular nature reserve for the spectacular views from the chalk hills. Adjacent M1 Bedfordshire.

Wildlife Trust for Beds, Cambs & Northants. Riddy Connectivity Restoration Bedfordshire: Riddy Connectivity Restoration project will help restore part of the River Ivel, and together with tree planting will provide a wildlife corridor allowing animals, including the endangered water vole, to move into the wider landscape surrounding the nearby The Riddy nature reserve.  

Berkshire, Buckinghamshire & Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust: The Woodland Wonders of Moor Copse – Berkshire: The Woodland Wonders of Moor Copse will benefit dormice, bats, butterflies and wildflowers. It will regenerate woodland and hedgerows and create a new wildlife pond for dragonflies and amphibians. The site is directly adjacent to the busy M4 and suffers from pollution and noise from the road.

Birmingham and Black Country Wildlife Trust - M5 Clean Rivers Project: M5 Clean Rivers Project will run a feasibility study and create a series of wetlands to help prevent pollution from the M5 from entering the River Rea and the River Stour. Kingfishers, otters and charismatic dippers will all benefit from the increase in aquatic invertebrates such as caddisfly, and small fish such as minnow, which require clean water to breed. 

Cumbria Wildlife Trust - peatland restoration: Peatland restoration in an area of badly damaged blanket bog, which needs re-wetting to enable it to store carbon and help combat climate change. Damaged and dried out peat releases carbon dioxide, increases flood risk, and reduces habitat for wildlife. The work will increase cottongrass, bilberry, cranberry, and bog rosemary and attract golden plover, short-eared owl, and snipe. The fell was bisected by the construction of the M6 motorway.

Cumbria Wildlife Trust - wildflower meadow restoration: Supporting wild and diverse pollinators including bumblebees, beetles, and moths through planting wildflower meadows close to urban housing estates near Penrith.

Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust - Chalk Grassland Restoration:

Two areas of nationally important chalkland in Hampshire are set for restoration, which could offer a boost to one of Britain’s rarest butterflies. The pair of chalk downland sites near Winchester, either side of the M3 motorway, cover approximately 65 hectares; one of them has been identified as a potential habitat for the rare Duke of Burgundy butterfly. Once restored these areas will contribute towards the creation of a much larger and better connected area of chalk grassland landscape, addressing the fragmentation and loss of chalk grassland habitat caused by the construction of the M3 in this area over 20 years ago.

Herefordshire Wildlife Trust - Lugg valley landscape Oak Tree Farm: At the heart of the Lugg Valley, improving connectivity between a wetland complex of more than 20 lakes alongside the A49. New wetland at Oak Tree Farm nature reserve for threatened lapwing and curlew; with riverside fields becoming a stepping stone between two of the most important county sites for wetland birds. Sustainable, natural drainage created next to an A49 outfall will aid water filtration running from the nearby road network before it enters the River Lugg SSSI.

Herts and Middlesex Wildlife Trust - Chalk River restoration and wetland improvement. River Lea Chalk River Resilience A1M: Four-year project to improve a watery wildlife corridor along the River Lea for wild brown trout, endangered water voles and specialist plants. Enhancing over 2km of rare chalk stream, restoring and extending reedbed and fen, as well as improve the chalk river’s resilience to floods and drought. It will also strengthen nature’s recovery in central Herts by better connecting two nature reserves at Lemsford Springs and Stanborough Reedmarsh. The A1M in Hertfordshire runs close to both nature reserves, surface water run off also impacts the river and wetland habitats.

Lancashire Wildlife Trust - Pollinator networks A56-M65: Creating a linear pollinator network on and near to the A56-M65, creating and restoring grasslands and other special places for insects to reverse the impacts of fragmentation and habitat loss caused by the road network. The project will focus on 100 hectares for pollinators including the solitary Tormentil Mining-bee, the Emperor Moth and the Green Hairstreak butterfly, and key food plants, Devil's-bit Scabious, Bilberry and Upright Tormentil.

Lancashire Wildlife Trust - Nature connections on the Manchester Mosses – M62: Nature connections on the Manchester Mosses, will re-create a nature recovery network across this endangered landscape, which is bisected by the M62. The project will improve, and re-wet lowland raised bog for specialist plants, including sphagnum mosses, improve carbon storage, and offer wildlife stepping stone sites and buffer areas.

Lancashire Wildlife Trust - Red Moss M61: Restoration and enhancement of Red Moss, a rare area of lowland raised peat bog adjacent to the M61. Re-wetting works will connect higher and drier parts of the bog with lower and wetter areas, allowing plants species such as the carnivorous sundews to colonise these new areas, and increasing the available habitat for wetland specialist wildlife.

Norfolk Wildlife Trust – East Winch Common: Investigation into how being close to the A47 might be affecting this protected nature reserve and the wildlife that calls it home. By studying how water moves into and out of East Winch Common, and how pollution from vehicles might be affecting the site and its wild inhabitants, the Trust will learn how to create a better place for wildlife. Restoration of ponds and wet heath habitat will follow, allowing species including cross-leaved heath, lousewort, dodder, sphagnum mosses and sundews to thrive.

Norfolk Wildlife Trust - Wymondham Green Bridge Conversion A11 And Silfield Newt Reserve (Two projects): Investigating the potential for a pilot scheme to convert an existing pedestrian bridge over the A11 to a green bridge, which would connect great crested newts to two County Wildlife Sites, including Silfield Newt Reserve. If successful, findings could support the creation of wildlife friendly and attractive green bridges across the UK.

Silfield Newt Reserve was created as a new home for an important population of protected great crested newts displaced when the nearby A11 was dualled. Pond creation and conservation work will provide additional essential habitat for great crested newts.

Northumberland Wildlife Trust - Semi Natural Ancient Woodland Restoration: Improving ancient Whittle Woodland, for wildflowers, azure bluebells and starry white wild garlic, by removing introduced conifer species and replanting with broadleaf trees for ancient woodland, such as oak, three ponds will also be restored giving amphibians and dragonflies a helping hand. Site is close to the A69.

Sheffield and Rotherham Wildlife Trust - Rotherham Rivers 3: Habitats around J33 of the M1 and the River Rother used to support much more wildlife, including the now endangered water vole. Rotherham Rivers 3 project sees long-term restoration on the River Rother with natural solutions altering the water flow to provide a variety of habitat and flow types, improving the river for fish and aquatic life. Floodplain work will allow isolated wildlife upstream and downstream to reconnect, and hopefully tempt the reclusive water vole to return.

Somerset Wildlife Trust - Dormouse Reconnected - M5: An ambitious and visionary project to connect fragmented populations of hazel dormice, which can be found along the M5 corridor on the edge of Taunton. The motorway development and the accompanying road bridges have isolated these charismatic animals from the wider landscape and other populations toward the Blackdown Hills, limiting available habitat, interactions and genetic diversity, which would otherwise provide the chance for them to expand and thrive. ‘Dormouse Reconnected’ is coming to the rescue, with specially made wildlife bridges and habitat improvements along and under the M5 to help this wonderful protected species to re-connect and thrive. The project will trial retrofitting wildlife bridges on the pillars of the underside of existing road bridges, near the ground, to allow dormice to travel up and down motorway embankments and to a culvert-bridge beneath the M5 to allow passage across the M5 corridor.

Suffolk Wildlife Trust – more biodiversity for the Broads: Wetland creation at Carlton Marshes nature reserve and restoring degraded arable land next to the River Waveney to a species-rich wetland full of life. Broadland dykes and wet grazing marsh will be restored, along with creating 20 new turf ponds. Avocets, redshanks, lapwing and marsh harriers will benefit, as well as a wide range of aquatic plants and insects such as dragonflies. The project area sits close to the A12 in Suffolk.

Suffolk Wildlife Trust - South Elmham Hall Wildlife Pond Network: Rediscovering South Elmham Hall’s former 'ghost ponds' within the ancient deer park and bringing them back to life as wildlife ponds. It’s hoped seeds that have been laying dormant for many years will spring back to life restoring what are now rare species, such as stoneworts. Insects will thrive, and in turn provide food for many species of birds such as skylarks and yellowhammers. The ponds will also be the perfect habitats for protected species such as great crested newts.

Suffolk Wildlife Trust - Suffolk Wool Towns Cluster: Farmers, working with their neighbours and the Wildlife Trust to achieve environmental goals at a landscape scale. Restoring six farmland ponds, enhancing grasslands for pollinators and making better field margins for wildlife corridors, increasing biodiversity and abundance. Suffolk Wool Towns Cluster is a group of 21 farms, covering 7,595ha around the towns of Shimpling, Lavenham and Long Melford.

Suffolk Wildlife Trust - Blyth Valley Farm Cluster: Blyth Valley Farm Cluster, farmers, working with their neighbours and supported by Suffolk Wildlife Trust, restoring farmland ponds, wetlands, woodland, grasslands and a traditional orchard. Working at landscape scale, with 21 farms in the Blythburgh - Bramfield area.

Warwickshire Wildlife Trust - Reconnecting Fillongley: Working across the landscape Reconnecting Fillongley will create and restore 14 ha of species rich lowland meadows, orchards and hedgerows enabling more connectivity for butterflies, birds and mammals. 15 ponds will act as stepping stones for amphibians and dragonflies, provide flood storage and slow the flow. Properties in the Fillongley area have been flooded six times since 2007, impacted by significant runoff of water from the M6 motorway. Natural solutions will reduce flood peaks.

Wiltshire Wildlife Trust - Langford Lakes: At Langford Lakes nature reserve, 11 hectares of wetland habitat will be created and enhanced for birds of conservation concern. New habitat features including a sand martin bank, tern rafts, an area of reedbed, wet grassland and muddy wetland margins will support breeding lapwing, breeding common tern, breeding sand martin. Langford Lakes is SSSI next to A36.

Wiltshire Wildlife Trust - Smallbrook Meadows nature reserve: Restoring a stretch of the River Were which flows through Smallbrook Meadows nature reserve, allowing it to once more meander through the floodplain creating space to support birds, mammals and vital insects. Creating scrapes for open water for plants and wildlife.