The innovative Landscapes for Living project aims to guide conservation work in the West Midlands for the next 50 years

The Woolhope Dome Project has been a flagship for the Trust. It is a project where we leave the security of our nature reserves and venture out into the wider countryside working with land owners and managers. The basic premise of the project was to ensure good conservation management on the best sites on the Dome, but also to develop corridors and stepping stones throughout the landscape to allow species to move freely between areas of good semi-natural habitat.

Now, try to imagine taking that holistic approach and applying it to the whole of the West Midlands! This is the vision that the West Midlands Wildlife Trusts and Biodiversity Partnership are developing through a new, innovative project called Landscapes for Living (LfL). The project will produce both a vision document and an opportunities map, which will guide our work in conservation for the next 50 years.

So, where has this all come from and what will the map and document look like?

Fundamentally LfL is our response to climate change. It is widely understood that to allow species and habitats to adapt to climate change we must have a countryside where things can move freely to find new suitable areas to live. The landscape scale approach recognises the need to address fragmentation of habitats and species, and seeks ways to increase the permeability of our countryside, and to provide the self same corridors and stepping stones that we talked of on Woolhope.

LfL also recognises that this work must be done in partnership with a wide range of organisations and individuals, and must cut across all sectors. A high quality environment not only provides for our wildlife, but also supports the economy, promotes health and well-being and can provide us with clean air, water and flood protection.

And being holistic and covering the whole of the West Midlands LfL has to include all the urban conurbations, which also must have a network of green spaces and corridors for wildlife to move through safely.

So what has LfL done? A consultancy has been contracted to undertake the work and boy have they been busy! A regional conference in November brought a wide range of interested parties together, and a vision was produced, and the outcomes of the first phase agreed. The consultants produced a draft map which was then taken to a series of county based meetings where the great and good gathered to share their own personal knowledge of the county and its wildlife. This information was then incorporated into the maps and an opportunities map has resulted.

The map illustrates the priorities and opportunities for landscape scale working across the region. The total proportional area of all habitats in each character unit was calculated and used to identify three zones. It also includes Strategic River Corridors, Major Urban Areas and development areas based on the current Regional Spatial Strategy.

To explain more simply! Zone 1 are the best bits, where the greatest proportion of semi-natural habitats and networks already exist, and includes some of the regions designated areas such as National Parks and AONBs. The vision here is to re-connect. Zone 2 is pretty good, quite a lot of good habitat and some functioning networks, its vision is to restore. And Zone 3, though not brilliant, still has potential for new linkages and habitat re-creation, which is its vision.

The urban areas are multi-functional, and the vision is to enhance: to provide an ecologically rich urban landscape.

And the Strategic River Corridors are really the region’s life blood, and contribute significantly to the region’s ecological networks. They will be the focus for enhancement, re-connection and restoration of habitats.

Both the map and the vision document, or Regional Prospectus, are at final draft stages at the time of writing, and by the time you read this should be finalised and published. The next step will be LfL Phase 2. This will be the opportunity to fine tune the maps at a county level. There will be more consultation and gathering of local knowledge and information to produce a detailed opportunities map. Together the map and prospectus will guide our work for the foreseeable future, and will hopefully put us in a better position to help our precious wildlife to successfully adapt to climate change.

A Living Landscape

A Living Landscape, a report by The Wildlife Trusts, calls for urgent Government action to prepare wildlife for climate change.  It contains a four-point plan which maps the way forward in countering climate change and restoring the UK’s battered ecosystems, for both wildlife and people; from inner cities to rural communities.

The full report (pdf download, 2.5MB) describes the science behind landscape-scale nature conservation with many examples of The Wildlife Trusts’ record in large scale conservation. It details policy changes needed to restore the UK’s ecosystems, including: using the planning system to enhance biodiversity; investing in management and restoration; tailoring policy and practice for landscape-scale restoration, and buying time to address climate change.

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