Wildlife Conservation

Wildlife Conservation

We want to turn nature’s recovery in Suffolk from an aspiration into a reality by making space for wildlife across the county and bringing nature into the places where people live their daily lives. ​This is one of the very biggest challenges that faces our society today.

Most of our plants and animals are declining and wildlife is under huge pressure. The UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world where one in ten face the threat of extinction. Sadly, an increasingly nature impoverished world is becoming normalised; as we forget what ‘wild’ looks like, we become poorer as a result.​ We urgently need this to change.

Our Nature Reserves

Suffolk Wildlife Trust has a rich history of buying and protecting our very best wildlife areas across the county, from our first reserve Redgrave & Lopham Fen acquired back in 1961, through to the amazing story of Carlton Marshes. Nature reserves are one of the fundamental pillars of wildlife conservation.

Today we have 50 nature reserves including a dazzling array of habitats and species. As a result of careful management, our nature reserves continue to provide refuges for our most charismatic and rarest species. They are exceptional places for wildlife helping them to survive and thrive in an increasingly crowded world.

Our Conservation work across Suffolk

Nature conservation in the last century succeeded in protecting some vital wildlife sites but wildlife has still declined. Nature reserves remain critical in slowing the decline in Suffolk’s rare habitats and species but we also know that we need to influence land right across the county. To achieve that, we work to provide effective protection for the many other places in the landscape that are still rich in wildlife. 

Where we can, we enhance the value of our reserves through targeted work with our neighbours, so that species can move out into the surrounding countryside, seeding nature’s recovery. At Suffolk Wildlife Trust we also invest time, effort, commitment and money into bringing wildlife back across a far wider area – stitching back together Suffolk’s tattered natural fabric of wild land, helping to create a joined-up network of places important for wild plants and animals.

We work with farmers and landowners, helping to support them to run an effective businesses, whilst also helping them to help our wildlife. We also provide specific advice to landowners with land along river corridors, recognising how important rivers are to connecting and linking species across the landscape.

As well as farmers and larger landowners, we also support those who own Private Nature Reserves, with staff and a team of volunteers who can help provide management advice and to smaller community groups who are inspired to help their local wildlife.

Protecting Suffolk’s most important wildlife from development

We respond to and influence the content of local plans that are developed by the local planning authorities to ensure safeguards for wildlife are in place. These are critical documents that can influence planning development in the local area for many years. We also work to influence large and significant planning developments, if we believe they will be damaging to very important wildlife sites and species. Whilst we cannot respond to many individual planning applications due to the sheer number each year, our planning advocacy work helps to ensure Suffolk’s most important wildlife is protected from inappropriate development.

Wilder Ecology

Suffolk Wildlife Trust’s in-house consultancy works with clients who are committed to deliver more for wildlife. Through our consultancy work, we can reduce the impacts our clients have on wildlife and help them do more, such as designing sensitive management plans and through Biodiversity Net Gain. Through our consultancy, we help our clients become exemplar wildlife custodians.