A few weeks ago, we were delighted to host our Nature Returns partners in Derbyshire. Since Natural England started funding the programme, we’ve had the opportunity to visit some of the other fantastic projects being delivered by Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust, the National Trust and Plymouth City Council. Please see the logos of the partner organisations involved at the bottom of this blog post, as there are too many to name!

The programme to date has provided opportunities to share knowledge and tap into the huge diversity of skills and experience across our partner projects as well as build relationships within the sector. You can find out more about Nature Returns and our other partner’s projects here.  

This time around it was DWT’s opportunity to host the forum, and a chance to share our progress and gather feedback on our Derwent Living Forest programme.  We started the first day of the visit at Allestree Park, which is the largest urban rewilding project in the UK located just north of Derby. Before our tour of the site, RBG Kew gave a demonstration of the equipment used in their research into LiDAR data collection and the relationship with carbon sequestration. It was a great opportunity to understand how technology can support nature recovery at a landscape scale.

On the tour, we stopped at different spots and discussed the changes we’re already seeing at Allestree such as natural colonisation of oak trees, a more varied scrub landscape, and areas where temporary pools of water have returned to the site helping to hold more water in the land. Community involvement has been central to our aims at Allestree and we shared how we are engaging local people through events such as ‘Be a Jay Day’ and ‘Be a Boar Day’ which are examples of how people can help to mimic natural processes  in the landscape.

Later in the afternoon we travelled slightly further north in the county to Nether Heage where we visited Common Farm, which is a recently purchased DWT site, thanks to a successful Crowdfunder. The site was previously used as mixed farmland and has lots of potential for nature restoration, nature-based solutions and the return of species to the landscape. Through our talks and conversations, we explained how rewilding spaces such as Common Farm are contributing towards our Derwent Living Forest (DLF) programme vision to connect sites across the Derwent catchment to provide more space for nature and, also importantly, storage for water.  

On day two, we convened in Derby to engage in sessions and presentations from programme staff and all of the partnership projects. Mel Stone and Mike Morecroft from Natural England gave an informative presentation which showed findings from the surveys to date. This was a valuable opportunity to understand the different survey methods being used to gather evidence regarding carbon and biodiversity benefits of the site. DWT’s survey teams have also been leading biodiversity surveys to ensure that we can look at all benefits where possible across our sites.

This was followed by case study presentations from each of the partners – we presented on our aspiration to set up a nature economy in the Derwent Living Forest, and we heard from other partners on various aspects of their projects from community engagement and working with contractors to delivering natural flood management. A further session gave time to discussing how best to communicate the impact of our projects more widely and share successes and lessons learned from the programme as a whole.

In the final presentations of the day, we heard from each partner project as they shared their vision for the future. It was really inspiring to see the progress that each of the projects has made so far, and it will be exciting to see the shared impact of them in the future.  We look forward to continuing to share best practice and knowledge with our partners and the wider public as the programme evolves.

To find out more about this programme please see here.