The Charnwood Forest Living What can the project offer? Woodland to wide open space - Free wildlife surveys and advice on positive and Until just a few thousand years ago Charnwood Landscape Project aims to practical management Forest is likely to have been covered in trees, perhaps with a few open areas where large animals - Input to grant applications, such as agri-environment such as deer and the now extinct Aurochs grazed. conserve and enhance the unique schemes Wolf, Brown Bear and Beaver would also have been - Guidance on other sources of funding wildlife, geology and character of present, to name but a few. Then, as people took to - A small grant scheme for habitat management work farming instead of hunting and gathering, they cut Charnwood Forest. - Support for tourism businesses with wildlife related down most of the trees to create extensive areas activities, such as farm trails The project, led by the Leicestershire and Rutland of arable and grazing land. By the late eighteenth - Free talks to local groups and organisations Wildlife Trust and supported by Aggregate Industries, century Charnwood Forest probably looked like a will work alongside farmers, landowners, businesses History of Charnwood Forest small, wetter, version of modern day Dartmoor, or and local communities to: a large Bradgate Park. There would have been wide Covering around 16,600 hectares the landscape of the open spaces of rough grazing land, boggy in places, l Protect and enhance the best sites for wildlife Charnwood Forest is strikingly different to anywhere else with patches of Heather and Bilberry around the l Create new habitats and reconnect fragmented in the East Midlands. Craggy hilltops, dry stone walls, crags and dirt tracks throughout. areas fast flowing streams, ancient woodlands and open views l Maintain important geological features define this unique area. The volcanic geology, comprising Enclosures and future change l Allow space for natural processes to operate some of England’s oldest rocks, combined with the The Enclosure Act of 1808 changed all of that. l Encourage less intensive land use and dynamic relationship between people and natural forces Land was drained and ploughed, and the landscape management is the key to this landscape and its diverse wildlife. became one of small fields bounded by hedges and walls, with just a few remnants of the former open l Support a sustainable local economy Volcanoes and ice landscape. Nevertheless, wildlife was still abundant, l Promote greater recognition, understanding and

The story of Charnwood Forest began in Precambrian but it became increasingly threatened in the enjoyment of Charnwood Forest’s natural assets times 600 million years ago. Violent volcanic eruptions twentieth century by more intensive land use. formed mountains which, over vast periods of time, The Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust and local have worn away into low craggy hills. Deserts and One thing for certain is that the landscape will naturalists have long been involved in the Charnwood ice sheets have come and gone and, since the ice last continue to change in the future. Our goal is Forest. Managing 800 acres of land and with many retreated in Britain about 11,000 years ago, people have to ensure that these changes occur without local members, the Trust has a lasting commitment to settled in increasingly large numbers, transforming the “ compromising the wildlife and wild places of Charnwood Forest. land themselves. Charnwood Forest.

Since 1975 Wood Our vision is for a Charnwood Forest that has a Charnwood Forest Warbler, Snipe, healthy environment, rich in geology, wildlife and is a superb area for Whinchat and wild places. There will be opportunities for people to fungi including the Fly Redstart have been learn about and enjoy the beautiful and exceptional Agaric, which is found lost as breeding in woodland, or beside landscape, set in a working environment. It will birds but on the isolated trees. It forms positive side Buzzard be a place where wildlife can move freely and not an intimate, mutually and Raven have be confined to a few special sites, and natural beneficial relationship re-colonized after processes are allowed to function - in other words a with the roots of its decades of absence. “living landscape. host, usually birch. We welcome your involvement and Charnwood Forest support in this project, whether you are a Living Landscape landowner, farmer, naturalist, parish, civic body or local resident.

Two things you could do for wildlife in the Charnwood Forest as a: Farmer/landowner: - Get in touch and tell us about your land, plans and ideas - Improve the wildlife habitats on your land perhaps through joining an agri-environment scheme

Local resident: - Join the Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust - Create a wild area in your garden, or think about the wildlife in your home - do you have bats in your roof or House Martins under your eaves?

Visitor: Photo credits: Green winged orchid (Paul Lane), Common buzzard (Steve Waterhouse), Trout (Amy Lewis), Spider - Follow the countryside code - take only photos tetragnatha extensa (Les Binns), Cropston Reservoir (Terry and leave only foot prints Davies), Natterer’s bat (Bat Conservation Trust) with - If you have enjoyed spending time in the area think thanks to Leicestershire & Rutland Bat Group, Bluebells about donating to the Leicestershire & Rutland (Terry Davies), Fly Agaric (Les Binns), Forester Moth (Steve Wildlife Trust Woodward). Other photos (LRWT).

Local authority/Parish council: Leicestershire & Rutland Wildlife Trust is working to protect - Ensure that you have the information and and enhance the wildlife and wild places of Leicestershire and policies needed to protect the special quality of Rutland and to engage people with their local environment. Charnwood Forest Our vision is for a Living Landscape rich in wildlife, valued and - Support the Charnwood Forest Living Landscape enjoyed by all. Project For further information please contact: Claire Install [email protected] 0116 248 7367 Local business: Uta Hamzaoui [email protected] 0116 248 7364 - Join the Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust as John Bristow [email protected] 0116 248 7365. a corporate member Registered office: The Old Mill - Think about your land or buildings and how they 9 Soar Lane, Leicester, LE3 5DE. website: www.lrwt.org.uk could be managed in a wildlife friendly way Charity No. 210531 Company Reg. No. 561833 Printed on recycled paper.

Protecting Wildlife for the Future Charnwood Forest has the highest density of Sites of Charnwood Forest Charnwood Forest has a high concentration of sites which Special Scientific Interest are good for wildlife, but they tend to be arranged in in Leicestershire & Rutland, clusters which are isolated from one another. The long- some designated due to term aim is to see links across the landscape allowing their wildlife value, others movement of species, which will enable our fauna and for their geology. flora to thrive for generations to come. A number of the sites shown are open to the public, “but many are on private land and have no public access.

Site of Special Scientific Interest Sadly, a number of plant species have been lost Local Bilberry, found on wild from the Forest in recent ” rocky heaths and acid times, including the Wildlife Site grasslands, is confined, Green-winged Orchid, in Leicestershire, to the a plant of old meadows. Charnwood Forest. Charnwood Forest does It is a low growing shrub however contain some of with edible fruits which the best old grasslands in ripen in late summer. the country.

The rocks moulding the Charnwood landscape date back through 600 million years of time, and contain fossils of some of the earliest large organisms to Around 250 species of spider have Charnwood Forest boasts four medium-sized reservoirs, three have evolved. been recorded from Charnwood of which are Sites of Special Scientific Interest designated for Forest since 1980, including the their plant communities and waterfowl, but they have been Common Stretch Spider. affected by increased nutrients in the water.

Farmers and land managers play a vital role in the future of Charnwood Forest. A number of farms in the area rear The most characteristic tree traditional breeds like Longhorn cattle. of the Charnwood Forest is undoubtedly the Oak, many of which are hundreds of years old. Both English and Sessile Oaks occur, the latter largely confined to old woodland and parkland while the former readily colonizes hedges and open ground.

The Forest’s bat population Quarrying has gone on in is of regional importance. The central and the Charnwood Forest for Relatively high woodland western portions of hundreds of years; the cover, tree-lined hedges and the Charnwood Forest area is now one of the streams, semi-natural land, fall within the National country’s main sources of reservoirs and old buildings Forest – a project to stone and contains some all contribute to this. increase woodland cover of the largest hard rock Leisler’s Bat and Natterer’s across 200 square miles quarries in Europe. Bat are particularly notable. of central England.

The small metallic blue- green Forester Moth is declining nationally, but is Swithland Wood lies in the found in the old species-rich east of Charnwood Forest grasslands of Charnwood and is one of the most Old meadow, ancient This material has been reproduced from Forest. Adults are attracted The Forest streams contain several fish species that are important ancient woodlands woodland, pasture Ordnance Survey 1:10000 Scale Raster with the permission of the controller of to Ragged-robin and rare elsewhere in Leicestershire, notably Brook Lamprey, in Britain; its plant woodland and marsh are Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, © Crown Devil’s-bit Scabious, but the Bullhead and native Brown Trout. The White-clawed communities are incredibly amongst the Forest’s Copyright. OS Licence No. 100039440 caterpillars feed on Sorrel. Crayfish is also found in some streams. rich and diverse. most valuable habitats.