UK Nature and Environment

A year has passed since Forestry England teamed up with Forest Holidays to support the wild area in Kielder Forest. The two organisations share a sustainable vision for the forest, and their work has had a big influence on the Wild Kielder project.

In 2023, Forest Holidays and Forestry England embarked on an innovative nature recovery project at Kielder - a pioneering study of environmental DNA (eDNA) from the soil in Kielder Forest revealed for the first time the variety of fungi and insects. This information aims to help Forestry England track biodiversity recovery in the area.

Thanks to the ongoing support from Forest Holidays, Forestry England commissioned a comprehensive habitat survey of the entirety of the 6,300-hectare Wild Kielder site. This year, over the summer and autumn, a team of surveyors have mapped and undertaken a condition assessment of each habitat, and established long-term vegetation monitoring plots.

A new family of beavers has been released into forests next to a Scottish loch with a heart-warming video showing the animals taking their first swim. The two adults and three kits were let out into restored wetland habitat at Loch Ard, near Aberfoyle, which falls within the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park.

Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) and the Beaver Trust worked together with the Loch Lomond park authority on this latest beaver release, with the FLS now having relocated 24 beavers to land it manages over the last 13 months. FLS previously created a network of ponds and new native woodland alongside the Duchray Water to restore a wetland environment.

Yorkshire Water has announced it is investing £1m to reduce storm discharges in East Yorkshire.

When heavy rainfall causes surface water to run into the sewers, overflows are discharged into waterways to prevent flooding in residential areas or waste backing up. But campaigners say this increases pollution levels in rivers and coastal areas.

The project in New Ellerby is part of a wider £180m scheme to cut the number of storm "overflows" across Yorkshire by April 2025, the water company said.

Here’s today’s existential crisis for you to tackle: when is a blackbird not a blackbird?

What shade of black qualifies its blackness and when does it become a greybird.

Or, in this avian mystery’s case, when can we call it a whitebird?

Those are the questions Andy Turner from Dorset has been asking himself after his cat, Ozzy, spotted one in his garden.

The organisation that manages the Broads National Park has warned that urgent action is needed to protect wildlife from the impact of climate change and pollution.

Declaring a biodiversity emergency, the Broads Authority said the area of open water and rivers in Norfolk and Suffolk had been losing species at a rate of six per decade in the past 50 years.

It said it wanted to raise public and political awareness and "foster stronger partnerships" on critical issues, because "time is running out".

Britain’s rare rainforests are home to wildlife from eagles to the world’s largest slugs and lichen looks like dragon skin, say conservationists battling to save them.

The Woodland Trust has unveiled a list of 11 “weird and wonderful” species that make their home in and around temperate rainforests found in the south-west and north-west of England, Wales and Scotland.

The forests once covered a fifth of Britain, but they have been lost from all but 1% of land area in the face of felling, overgrazing and conversion to other uses, face ongoing pressures including invasive species and are more threatened than their tropical counterparts, conservationists say.

The conservation of the elusive Jack Snipe bird is being bolstered by new funding through the Purple Horizons Nature Recovery Project, coordinated by Natural England.

This funding will support vital nature recovery efforts in Staffordshire, focusing on safeguarding and enhancing wetland habitats for this important bird species.

Jack Snipe are small wetland birds that migrate to Britain in winter, feeding on insects, worms, and plants in soft mud. The bird’s presence helps to tell us the health of wetland ecosystems. Funding will support targeted research and habitat improvements to ensure their survival and well-being in Staffordshire.

THIS time of year can be a great time to plant native trees and seeds.

According to the Eden Rivers Trust, cold weather and dark nights are perfect opportunities to plant seeds.

Plants are dormant in the winter months meaning that they suffer less transplant shock when planted or moved, require significantly less water, and reap the benefits of a reduction in pests and plant diseases active during the colder months.

A PATHWAY for Scotland to become the world’s first "rewilding nation" has been presented to the Scottish Government by the Scottish Rewilding Alliance.

The coalition of more than 20 organisations presented the plan to Minister for Climate Action, Dr Alasdair Allan MSP, at a reception in Edinburgh on Tuesday.

The group set out what it describes as a "trailblazing vision of hope" for Scotland requiring leadership from government in line with its international commitments, urging ministers to commit to nature recovery across 30% of the country’s land and sea.

Cumbria Wildlife Trust is seeking to recruit the help of nature-friendly farmers and landowners in the south of the county to boost the declining number of grassland wildflowers and plants in Cumbria. We aim to re-introduce rarer species to suitable sites, particularly in the Windermere and Ambleside areas.

In a two-year project, up to 40,000 plants will be grown at our nursery at Gosling Sike near Carlisle. Working alongside landowners, we'll then add a variety of these plug plants to South Lakeland sites and help the landowners provide the best conditions for them to prosper.

The scheme will provide participating farmers and other landowners with botanical surveys, soil testing, plug plants, and a management plan, all free of charge.* Farmers, foresters and land managers can use these to help them look after and improve the environment. They can also be used to support and inform applications for Countryside Stewardship (CS) schemes and Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) schemes.

A new wetland project will transform Clapham Common, boosting biodiversity and providing an educational resource for schoolchildren in the area.

Friends of Clapham Common and Wild Clapham have secured planning permission from Lambeth council to begin work on its Wetland and Reedbeds project after reaching its funding target.

Shirley Kermer, chairman of Friends of Clapham Common said: “The creation of this wetland habitat is an important step in our ambition to improve the ecology of Clapham Common.”

Water companies are planning to build a pipeline network to move treated sewage away from conservation areas and into rivers, lakes and seas which do not have the same legal protection.

The work will be funded by customers and the water regulator, Ofwat, has provisionally said bills would rise by an average of £19 a year between 2025 and 2030.

Billions of pounds could be spent on the projects - including 10 schemes being planned by Severn Trent Water.

More frequent sightings of a rare marsh bird at nature reserves have prompted hopes they may start to breed.

Northumberland Wildlife Trust said bitterns, a member of the heron family, have overwintered regularly in recent years at several of its sites at Druridge Bay.

The charity is running a project, Biodivesity Boost, to create better habitats for the birds with a mixture of reed beds, ditches and pools to encourage them to stay for the spring breeding season.

One of Britain’s largest species of beetle has been found in Dorset for the first time in more than 200 years.

A Bournemouth University student discovered two great silver water beetles while surveying animal and plant life in the Blackmore Vale as part of his master’s degree.

Wren Franklin checked his discovery with the county’s recorder for beetles, who confirmed the last recorded sighting of them was in 1821 by influential entomologist JC Dale.

Moorland of "exceptional ecological importance" has been added to a mountain nation reserve in a 62% extension of the site.

The Manx Wildlife Trust bought the extra 43 acres (17.4 hectares), which is adjacent to the land originally purchased in 1995, with money from a corporate donation.

The expansion makes the now 112-acre (27.9 hectare) Dalby Mountain Nature Reserve the second largest of its kind on the Isle of Man.

Raw sewage spills have pushed levels of harmful bacteria in Belfast Lough beyond legal limits, a BBC Spotlight investigation has found.

Expert water sampling found levels of bacteria at some popular swimming spots were more than three times higher than permitted for bathing waters.

Northern Ireland Water has admitted breaching the law hundreds of times each year by releasing untreated sewage into the lough.

The largest seagrass restoration project in the UK has come to an end after five years of work, with some areas showing signs of "recovery" as a result.

The £2.5m project, funded by the EU and run by the Plymouth-based charity Ocean Conservation Trust (OCT), aimed to reverse decades of decline which had seen seagrass disturbed and wiped out by coastal pollution and human activity.

Seagrass can absorb carbon dioxide faster than trees, making it a natural defence against climate change and an important part of the marine ecosystem.

Today marks the first day of the 2025 PondNet Spawn Survey. We’re inviting people across the UK to get involved by recording Common Frog and Common Toad spawn they have spotted in their garden, community ponds, and out in the countryside.

Freshwater Habitats Trust has been collecting data on sightings of breeding frogs and toads since 2012. With 2,064 records added, the 2024 PondNet Spawn Survey was the biggest so far.

Sightings typically start in the South West, often before Christmas. Last year, the first record was from a large puddle near St Ives in Cornwall on 21st December, followed by another from a garden pond in the village of Lesnewth in the Valency Valley, North Cornwall on Christmas Eve.

The Government may have failed to comply with environmental laws when it granted use of a banned pesticide toxic to bees, a watchdog has warned.

The Office for Environmental Protection (OEP) is investigating the Environment Department (Defra)’s emergency authorisation for the use of the neonicotinoid thiamethoxam on sugar beet seeds in 2023 and 2024.

As part of the investigation, launched in June, the environmental watchdog has issued an “information notice” to Defra setting out alleged failures to comply with a number of environmental laws, why it is serious, and requesting specific information relating to the allegations.

A successful breeding season for a colony of one of the UK's rarest seabirds depleted by bird flu is giving conservationists "hope for the future".

Roseate terns on Coquet Island, off the Northumberland coast, saw a record number of 191 chicks hatched this year, with 92% going on to fledge.

The island hosts the only colony in the UK of the threatened species, which are ranked at the highest level of conservation concern.

But the RSPB said it was "too early" to say if it was a sign of recovery from the avian influenza of 2022 and 2023.

Two spinal cords, a dozen ribs and a hollowed-out head lie next to a peak called “rock of the eagle” in Gaelic. These are the remains of a pair of three-month-old lambs. It’s muggy, and maggots and foxes will make light work of the remaining skin and bone. In a few weeks, it’ll be as if it never happened.

Ruaridh MacKay, who has been farming here at Stronmagachan Farm in Inveraray for 25 years, picks up one of the spinal cords: sodden and slimy from successive fronts of rain, every morsel of flesh has been excavated. He was expecting to take these lambs to market next month.

All around are miles of sheep-grazed hills, like a giant lawn spun inside a tumble dryer. The valley is bowl-shaped and gets steeper the higher it rises, finishing in sheer rock. The sheep that live up here are bred for these conditions – both farmer and sheep have long lineages. Farming on these hills has changed little in 150 years.

Bee-killing pesticides have been found in 85% of tested rivers in England, an analysis of Government figures has found.

Green groups looked at Environment Agency data on neonicotinoid pesticides in river sites tested between 2023 to 2024.

They also found that the proportion of rivers affected appears to have increased from 79% during the testing period of 2020 to 2022.

We are into December and the solstice is not so far away, so it is time for our seasonal banner competition.

So please comment below with a link to any photos that you have taken or artwork that you have made that you would like to be considered for the banner. Let’s say a maximum of three items per person; photos that you have taken or art you have created and have the rights to; something suitable for the subject of the community: maybe a natural landscape, or wildlife, or volunteers working for the environment (as long as you have the permission of anyone identifiable in the photo) or something along those lines. And preferably, but not necessarily, “Winter” themed.

I’m not absolutely clear about the optimum dimensions etc for a banner, but the size and shape of the section that appears varies with the browser dimensions and appears differently again in the sidebar, so keep that in mind. Otherwise the larger the better.

I’ll leave this post stickied until midnight on Sat Dec 14th for submissions then put up a voting thread for the following week with all the submissions that we have by then and then decide the winner on the 20th. It’ll basically be on upvotes, but I reserve the right to disqualify any ‘Naturey McNatureface’ ones or others that I really don’t think are suitable. The winner will become the banner until the spring equinox and the next competition, and obviously we’ll make it clear in the sidebar who should be credited for that banner.

An award-winning photographer has captured a stunning image of an orca closing in on an otter in Lerwick harbour.

Ryan Leith shared the “unforgettable experience” on social media and with The Shetland Times.

It was taken yesterday (Friday) morning as the 64 pod of orcas pursued an otter from the Loofa Baa to the North Ness, where Mr Leith was stood watching at the time.