The RSPB UK Headquarters The Lodge, Sandy, Bedfordshire SG19 2DL Tel: 01767 680551 Northern Ireland Headquarters Belvoir Park Forest, Belfast BT8 7QT Tel: 028 9049 1547 Scotland Headquarters 2 Lochside View, Edinburgh Park, Edinburgh EH12 9DH Tel 0131 317 4104 Wales Headquarters Sutherland House, Castlebridge, Cowbridge Road East, Cardiff CF11 9AB Tel: 029 2035 3000 www.rspb.org.uk The RSPB speaks out for birds and wildlife, tackling the problems that threaten our environment. Nature is amazing – help us keep it that way. We belong to BirdLife International, the global BirdLife INTERNATIONAL partnership of bird conservation organisations. RSPB RESERVES 2012 As a charity, the RSPB is dependent on the goodwill and financial support of people like you. Please visit www.rspb.org.uk/supporting or call 01767 680551 to find out more. Front cover: Red-necked phalarope by Steve Knell (rspb-images.com) The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) is a registered charity: England & Wales no. 207076, Scotland no. SC037654 120-1639-11-12 Yell Ramna Stacks & Gruney Fetlar Mousa Loch of Spiggie Sumburgh Head Noup Cliffs North Hill Birsay Moors Trumland The Loons and Loch of Banks Onziebust Mill Dam Marwick Head Brodgar Cottasgarth & Rendall Moss Copinsay Hoy Hobbister Durness Dunnet Head Eilean Hoan Broubster Leans Loch na Muilne Forsinard Flows Priest Island Troup Head Vallay Edderton Sands Balranald Nigg and Udale Bays Ardmore Culbin Sands Loch of Strathbeg Fairy Glen Loch Ruthven Meikle Loch Eileanan Dubha Corrimony Ballinlaggan Abernethy Insh Marshes The Crannach Fowlsheugh Coll Glenborrodale The Reef Loch of Kinnordy Skinflats Tay Inversnaid Colonsay Vane Farm Oronsay Inner Clyde Fidra Fannyside Smaull Farm Lochwinnoch Inchmickery Loch Gruinart/Ardnave Baron’s Haugh The Oa Horse Island Bogside Flats Aird’s Moss Rathlin Ailsa Craig Coquet Island Lough Foyle Ken-Dee Marshes Wood of Cree Kirkconnell Merse Crook of Baldoon Campfield Marsh Larne Lough Islands Mersehead Geltsdale Belfast Lough Lower Lough Erne Islands Portmore Lough Mull of Galloway & Scar Rocks Saltholme Haweswater St Bees Head Aghatirourke Strangford Bay & Sandy Island Lyth Valley Hodbarrow Leighton Moss & Morecambe Bay Bempton Cliffs Carlingford Lough Islands Hesketh Out Marsh Fairburn Ings Marshside Read’s Island Blacktoft Sands The Skerries Dove Stone Tetney Marshes Valley Wetlands VDearnealley – Old Moor and Bolton Ings South Stack Cliffs Dee Estuary Beckingham Marshes Conwy Eastern Moors Malltraeth Marsh Langford Lowfields Morfa Dinlle Coombes & Churnet Valleys Freiston Shore Titchwell Marsh Lake Vyrnwy Frampton Marsh Snettisham Sutton Fen Mawddach Woodlands Middleton Lakes Mid Yare Valley Nene Washes Berney Marshes & Breydon Water Ynys-hir Sandwell Valley Ouse W ashes Lakenheath Fen Ouse Fen (Hanson-RSPB project) Dingle Marshes Carngafallt Minsmere Fen Drayton Lakes Snape North Warren Gwenffrwd/Dinas The Lodge Fowlmere Havergate Island & Boyton Marshes Stour Estuary Wolves & Ramsey Woods Ramsey Island HighnamWoods Old Hall Marshes Otmoor Wallasea Island Grassholm Cwm Clydach Nagshead Rye Meads South Essex Marshes Church Wood Cliffe Pools Newport Wetlands Northward Hill Winterbourne Downs Rainham Marshes Nor Marsh & Motney Hill Shorne Marshes Great Bells Farm Normanton Down Seasalter Levels Elmley HamWall Farnham Heath Harty Marshes Chapel Wood Barfold Copse Tudeley Marshes Lydden Valley Greylake Blean Woods Isley Marsh West Sedgemoor Woods Broadwater Warren Garston Wood Dungeness ForeWood Aylesbeare Common Adur Estuary Lewes Brooks Exe Estuary Arne Pulborough Brooks and Amberley Wildbrooks Labrador Bay Bracklesham Bay Radipole Lake Wareham Pilsey Island Lodmoor Meadows Langstone Harbour Hayle Estuary Brading Marshes Grange Heath Marazion Marsh Stoborough Heath Locations of RSPB reserves Featured reserves 1 RSPB Reserves 2012 A review of our work COMPILED BY MALCOLM AUSDEN AND JO GILBERT Contents Our vision 3 Introduction 5 Reserves and wildlife – a review of 2011 7 Progress towards bird species targets 8 Wildlife discoveries 12 Land acquisition 14 Condition of RSPB-managed SSSIs/ASSIs 15 Saving nature 17 Re-introducing lost species to RSPB nature reserves 18 Farming with nature 22 Management of reedbeds for bitterns and other wildlife 24 Lusty More island – restoration management for curlews in Fermanagh 28 Our amazing Orkney reserves 32 Meet some of our special species 36 Increasing the breeding success of lowland wet grassland waders using predator exclusion fences 40 Re-wetting Wolves Wood 44 Managing coastal erosion – the Titchwell Coastal Change Project 46 What future for our wintering geese? 50 Working in Partnership 55 Reversing habitat loss at Dove Stone – from bare peat to a green recovery 56 The Strathspey Wader Futurescape 60 Reserves and people – a review of 2011 65 People on reserves in 2011 66 Access to Nature – the South Essex People and Wildlife Programme 70 Springwatch at Ynys-hir 74 Nature Counts 78 The economic benefits of nature reserves 82 Supporting partners around the world 87 The Gola Rainforest: Sierra Leone’s first Rainforest National Park 88 Thank you to our supporters 92 2 Andy Hay (rspb-images.com) Stone-curlews continue to increase on habitat created for them at Winterbourne Downs and Minsmere. RSPB RESERVES 2012 3 Our vision Our vision is to help achieve a wildlife-rich future by doubling the area of land managed as RSPB nature reserves by 2030; protecting our most special places for birds and all wildlife; and redressing past losses through habitat restoration and creation. Our reserves will be wonderful places, rich in wildlife, where everyone can enjoy, learn about and be inspired by the wealth of nature. Working with neighbouring landowners, we will help enhance the quality of the surrounding countryside through our Futurescapes programme. Increasingly, we will focus on restoring land of low ecological interest to that of high quality. We set challenging targets, but more is needed given the size of the task facing all of us. 4 RSPB RESERVES 2012 Andy Hay (rspb-images.com) Our new nature reserve at Middleton Lakes – a place for people to connect with nature. INTRODUCTION 5 Introduction Saving Nature Over the centuries, humans have Another site where we have been animals, and having the right training altered our natural environment restoring nature is at The Lodge – the to do so. beyond all recognition: woodlands RSPB’s UK headquarters. The Lodge have been felled, heathlands protects remnant heath, once part of a We are clear that there are people ploughed or afforested and much larger sweep of heathland along who wish to learn, and the creation wetlands drained. And with these the Greensand Ridge of Bedfordshire of identification guides, whether in changes, our collective memory of and Cambridgeshire. In recent years, print or on-line, has done much to what our natural environment was we have removed 44 hectares of support this. But the emphasis on like fades too. Each succeeding conifers and spread heather seed. It is ecosystem processes, rather than generation tends to accept “their” incredibly rewarding to see heather more traditional approaches to botany time as a baseline against which steadily colonising the restored area. and zoology, mean that access to further change is benchmarked. formal learning is declining. We have The two sites are connected in been delighted to play a small role in As a conservation body, the RSPB’s rather a special way. Middleton is an trying to address this skills gap role can be captured quite simply as important place in the ecological through "Nature Counts", a Heritage trying to create a world richer in history of Britain, as Middleton Hall Lottery Fund (HLF) supported project wildlife, and wanting our children to was home to Francis Willughby and under which we are supporting 12 inherit the environment in a better state John Ray, who produced the first ecologists over three years to work than we found it. So we will protect the truly scientific attempt at plant with RSPB ecologists to develop their best of our natural environment, but we classification. Ray’s Cambridge taxonomic and identification skills, also want to restore what we have lost. Catalogue of plants, published in focusing on more difficult, under- We conserve wildlife for its own sake, 1660 and researched whilst he was a recorded groups of species. We hope and for our benefit, by providing Fellow at Trinity College, describes the result will add to a new ecosystem services that we all the botany of a now largely lost generation of ecologists, better accept from the natural environment, landscape, including the Lower equipped to help us understand and knowingly or not. These include clean Greensand ridge. He gives a vivid contribute to the conservation of a water, carbon storage, food, flood insight into what we might aim for as rapidly changing world, as well as defence and natural space to enjoy, to part of the restoration: for example, helping the RSPB to manage name but a few. shepherd’s cress Teesdalia reserves better in the short-term. nudicaulis, found "in a sandy lay near During 2011, we were pleased to open the windmills beyond Gamlingay our new reserve at Middleton Lakes, towards Sandy", is now only present near Tamworth on the north-east edge in a few small colonies. It would be of the Birmingham conurbation. In this good to see its former abundance area of wetland remodelled from old restored. Lamb’s succory Arnoseris gravel workings, we are putting minima, is now extinct and would something back into an area which has require reintroduction, probably to suffered huge ecological loss. Over areas of disturbed ground. Gwyn Williams time, we hope that Middleton will Head of Reserves & Protected Areas become a gateway site for people to We now take the ability to identify connect with nature; to enjoy, learn the plants and animals around us for and, on their return home, perhaps granted. But this obviously depends commit to taking individual actions to on successive generations wanting Martin Harper benefit nature.