Collaven Moor Appeal with the Devon Wildlife Trust - the target is getting close!
Appeals are coming in thick and fast at the moment, and one appeared in my post today from the Devon Wildlife Trust.
They are looking to raise £58,000 by the 31st January 2025, the aim being to double the size of one of the most important spaces for nature in Devon!
Six miles west of Okehampton, Collaven Moor is home to extremely diverse plant communities, and it could provide an amazing haven to threatened wildlife such as willow tits, southern damselflies and marsh fritillary butterflies.
Now, the Devon Wildlife Trust has been given the first option to buy Collaven Moor, next to the Trust’s Sourton Quarry nature reserve. It’s a short flight away from one of the remaining populations of southern damselflies – who are very rare.
If Collaven Moor can become part of the Trust’s nature reserve, then this would expand the range for these insects and help them thrive!
It could help animals such as the grasshopper warbler, because it offers the ideal conditions for them to breed successfully, with grasslands to support the insect prey it needs. The Meadow thistle and great burnet (rarely found in this part of Devon), can be seen in summer. Marsh fritillary butterflies thrive on the meadow thistle, whilst goldfinches love its seed heads. The purchase will help the common blue butterfly and the narrow-bordered bee hawkmoth.
This is a wonderful opportunity to give wildlife and plants the chance to survive and thrive in Devon! But the site has no legal protection – so the space could be lost to development or someone who isn’t sympathetic to wildlife needs and the potential for helping these insects.
All donations are welcome and just to give you an idea, the Trust says:
- £40 buys 30 square metres of land
- £67 buys 50 square metres of land
- £134 buys 100 square metres of land
- £268 buys 200 square metres of land
If the Trust can succeed in raising the funds needed to make the purchase, it will add a big area to the patchwork of habitats in this corner of the beautiful county of Devon!
All donations will support the purchase of Collaven Moor, including associated legal and other costs. If more funds are donated than are needed for the purchase, then they will be used to fund habitat management there and on other Devon Wildlife Trust nature reserves.
Image at top of page copyright Devon Wildlife Trust
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