The Trust’s Thriving in a Wilder Trent project has been awarded £875,602 to enable the Trust and partners to create new habitats to benefit a range of species from common terns to bitterns and otters across the Trent Valley.

The project is one of only twenty across England to be funded through the Species Survival Fund – a partnership with Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs and The National Lottery Heritage Fund.  Locally it will deliver work with farmers and landowners covering a 90 km stretch of the River Trent from Dunham Bridge in North Notts, to Willington in Derbyshire, improve 28 kilometres of canal and 50 hectares of farm wetland and marshland for wildlife.

The project will increase the area of existing priority floodplain habitats including reedbed, wet woodland and hedgerows, and bring new land into positive management to enhance connectivity. Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust sites that will benefit include Attenborough Nature Reserve near Beeston, Skylarks Nature Reserve at Holme Pierrepont and Besthorpe Nature Reserve in the Trent Vale north of Newark.  In addition to enhancing established nature reserves, the project will fund habitat creation in partnership with private landowners.

The Species Survival Fund, a partnership between Defra and The National Lottery Heritage Fund, has seen grants of up to £3 million awarded across England for habitat creation and restoration projects to run over the next two years. The fund will create and improve natural habitats, helping Defra to meet their target to protect 30% of land for nature by 2030 (known as 30by30).

Eilish McGuinness, Chief Executive, The National Lottery Heritage Fund, added: “We are delighted to be working in partnership with Defra again to distribute funding for these projects, which will support nature recovery by helping to boost the quality and quantity of wildlife-rich habitats across England.  This partnership will further our vision for heritage to be valued, cared for and sustained for everyone, now and in the future. 

Environment Minister, Rebecca Pow, said: “The funding awarded today as part our flagship Species Survival Fund will enable local authorities, landowners, farmers, and our protected landscapes organisations to restore nature at scale and provide valuable green jobs in the process. 

“Only by creating bigger and better habitats for wildlife will we be able to halt the alarming decline in species loss. This fund will be a key plank in achieving our legally binding targets to halt species loss and protect 30% land for nature by 2030.”