There’s good news from the Shropshire Hills. 

National Trust volunteers have planted over 2,000 native trees there as part of a big conservation project.

Introducing the Stepping Stones project

Stepping Stones is a landscape-scale conservation project.  It’s aiming to improve the area, restoring habitats and linking them together, thereby creating wildlife corridors.

Volunteers have planted wildlife-friendly saplings such as elder, holly, hawthorn and rowan.  These trees will give nectar, berries and shelter for birds and other wildlife in the future and they will create a corridor that connects areas for wildlife.  

Wildlife corridors are critical to wildlife

The idea of wildlife corridors is that wildlife can move through an area, because the corridors link up areas of habitat so they can get from A to B – almost like their own motorway network, or railway system.

This project is necessary because the area – like so many others – has lost many hedgerows and trees in fields.  This is because of agricultural practices which have changed over time.

Patches of woodland have been cut off from each other – so species such as dormice get stuck in one area – they need hedgerows to move through an area.  Less scrub and thicket have meant less breeding habitat for songbirds.

So planting long strips of native woodland – very wide hedgerows – have created new habitat which link up other areas.

This plan will help strengthen the network of woodland corridors

The ultimate idea is to strengthen the network of woodland habitat in the area.   This really will help wildlife move about safely – they will have somewhere to nest and rest, too, and it will make the landscape look even more beautiful for us all to enjoy!

You can support the National Trust’s Stepping Stones appeal here.

International Animal Rescue have a petition on line.  And it needs all of us to support it. 

They need all of us to help join their fight to end bear poaching in Armenia and to rescue the bears who are left and waiting for us to help free them.  They are being kept in terrible conditions.

IAR has been working with the Foundation for the Preservation of Wildlife and Cultural Assets (FPWC), their partners in Armenia.   So far they have rescued over 30 bears.

It’s time to Break the Cage!

IAR estimate that there could be as many as 50 more bears who are waiting to be rescued.  They need all our help to set these bears free.

The brown bears are poached from the wild and then locked up in tiny cages.  Usually their mothers are killed, and the little cubs are captured and sold into a miserable life. They may be kept in tiny squalid cages.  They eat scraps, and drink dirty water.

Please sign IAR’s petition to end this horrible trade.

And please spread the word!

There’s a new series on BBC2 on Sunday evenings:   Climate Change:  Ade on the Frontline.

Ade Adepitan looks at climate change and the impact it is having on the environment – however, he is also looking at some amazing people who are doing what they can to  help stop the pace at which is progressing and/or help the species affected by it.  He is looking for solutions to climate change around the world. 

And he does touch on the fact he is flying around the world to bring this to us.  But unless we all find out what is happening in various locations and how people and wildlife and nature are being affected by climate change, there won’t be a story to tell. 

Solomon Islands

Ade starts off in the Solomon Islands and we see and hear first-hand from local people who are affected by rising sea levels. 

Great Barrier Reef

Adi heads to the Great Barrier Reef, one of the wonders of the world – and a breeding spot for the green turtle.   Because the world is getting warmer, so is the sand and that has meant that that nearly all the turtles being born are female.  This presents a major problem because it means that there are very few males being born.   Adi finds out about a project which is trying to cool the sand so that more male green turtles might be born. 

One of the questions Adi asks is “how do we wean ourselves off fossil fuels?” 

Rural Queensland

He visits rural Queensland, a heart breaking visit because of the draught, and the city of Sydney where an amazing woman from Sydney Wildlife is working hard to help all the bats which have been affected by the terrible wildfires.

Ozharvest

And he visits the incredible people involved in Ozharvest – they collect food which is due to be chucked from the supermarkets and take it to a market where people can get it for free, to save it being wasted.  The young woman from Ozharvest says a simple thing we can all do is to plan what we need when we shop and buy just what we need.  When you know that people are going hungry in the world, that fact is made worse by the amount of food being wasted elsewhere – and when you add how much that impacts on the environment and climate change, that makes things much worse.

Tasmania

Finally Adi heads to Tasmania where plants – giant kelp - are being planted under the water as they excel at sucking up CO2 and also they grow at an incredible rate.  Their success is hampered by sea urchins so there is a project to try to encourage people to eat sea urchins so that we might gain control over them.

He also sees how wind power in Tasmania could be used to power some of Australia’s mainland cities/places through a cable under the sea.

We can turn things around

Finally, Adi meets one of Australia’s top thinkers on climate change, an ex-Greenpeace employee, Paul Gilding, who warns that the plant is on the verge of total collapse.   He believes we can turn things around.  The key, he says, is to eliminate all fossil fuels by 2030.   Governments must have the strength to enforce it – and it is up to you and I, the people who vote them in, to put the pressure on and show them that they must get on with it. 

Next week features Bangladesh and Bhutan – don’t miss it!   BBC2 at 8pm, Sunday 18 April 2021.

Useful resources:

Sydney Wildlife

 Ozharvest

Turtle Cooling Project

Giant Kelp Restoration Project in Tasmania

The World Land Trust is a conservation charity that works with local conservation partners all over the world.  It is an amazing charity and one of my favourites.

One of things it has is an Action Fund.  This is something people who care about conservation can donate to, and what it enables the Trust to do is to put the donations into action fast if a piece of vital wildlife habitat is in danger of being lost.  The Trust can work with partners on the ground and ensure that the habitat is purchased and saved for wildlife and for local people living in the area.

The Action Fund was put into action recently; and as a result, there’s a natural safe habitat for the incredible 1,000 mature black-and-chestnut eagle.  There are fewer than 1,000 of these left in the world, so very few indeed.

But they now have a natural safe haven in Ecuador!

The World Land Trust reported that over 34,000 acres were added to endangered eagle haven in Ecuador.   Their partner Naturaleza y Cultura Ecuador (NCE for short) has worked been working hard for four years, and as a result, the Santiago Municipal Reserve was officially declared in March 2021!

Scientists have already recorded 344 plant species, 152 bird species, 57 amphibian, 47 mammals and 11 reptiles in the area so it is full of wildlife.

It expands a key corridor- the Sangay-Podocarpus Connectivity Corridor – and it sits between two national parks in Ecuador.   Last year the corridor became Ecuador’s first corridor – is covers 1.4 million acres of diverse, fragile   ecosystems, and includes a bit of another reserve – the Podocarpus – El Condor Biosphere Reserve.  WLT works here with NCE.  Animals such as the jaguar and bear will be able to roam safely.

The connections go further, because north of the corridor is 200 mile long spine of reserves and national parks along the eastern Andes, connected by reserves backed by the World Land Trust in the llanganates-Sangay Biological Corridor with Fundacion Ecominga. 

The networked protected areas cover about 4 million acres!

How was this money raised to buy this 34,000 acres?   In part, by World Land Trust supporters who donated to the Action Fund.  It really does make a difference.

Read all about the 34,000 acres saved in Ecuador and the impact for the network here.