Today we have a guest post from Grahame Madge. Grahame tells us about how it's not just birds that benefit on RSPB nature reserves.
Visit any of our nature reserves and one of the first things that we hope you notice is the teeming birdlife.
From the chattering songs of reed and sedge warblers at Marazion Marsh to the mournful wailing of singing red-throated divers on Fetlar, our 214 reserves span the UK from Cornwall to Shetland.
But the next time you visit an RSPB reserve try to think beyond the birds.
We do. In fact, it’s a startling statistic that RSPB nature reserves are important for many other species too: thousands of them.
In fact 97 per cent of species recorded on our reserves aren’t birds. So far we’ve discovered 16,000 species, including a multitude of moths, mosses, mallows, molluscs and mammals, and we think there are many more still to be recorded.
There is another species for which our reserves are important: man.
Lots of them, in fact, every year. Many come to enjoy nature. Some also come to share the lessons we learn from managing land on an estate which extends to around four times the size of the Isle of Wight.
We have developed a large amount of expertise of managing specific habitats and the Society has a national responsibility for some habitats. For example have 13 per cent of the UK’s coastal shingle, more than one sixth of all of the UK’s reedbeds and more than one fifth of all the UK’s native pine woodland – beloved of red squirrels, capercaillie and Scottish crossbills.
We carry out a lot of innovative habitat restoration and vital management, and sharing this best practise is a big part of what we do.
With this in mind we have produced a showcase of examples of good management from managing land for butterflies at Winterbourne in Wiltshire, to how we bring nature closer for visitors to Rainham Marshes in the Thames Gateway.
We also pioneer innovative habitat restoration techniques that provide both good wildlife habitat together with additional benefits, known in the trade as ecosystem services: the much-celebrated win-win that you hear a lot about in conservation.
At Dovestone in the Peak District , and Medmerry, in Sussex , we are working at an ever-increasing scale, and in partnership with a wide range of other organisations. Much of the innovative thinking on our reserves involves taking into account the projected impacts of climate change in our habitat restoration and management.
Climate change is a huge threat to nature and mankind alike, but by managing land with climate change in mind, it’s possible to roll with the punch and help nature and people.
At Dovestone, in partnership with United Utilities, we’re working to re-establish degraded blanket peat bog – an internationally important habitat that also helps to rewet upland landscapes, reduce carbon losses and protect water supplies.
Along the Channel Coast at Medmerry, in a project led by the Environment Agency, we have set back sea defences, lowering costs of managing flood risk, while creating an ideal habitat for a range of species, even including birds.