Plenty in reserve

More than 2000 local reserves offer fragments of paradise in every corner of the country. Know yours?

WE’RE NATURALLY DRAWN to colourful personalities who are easy to understand – and the big stars of the landscape stand out just as they do in sport, acting or pop music. The Manchester Uniteds, Scarlett Johanssons and Lake Districts of the world command great audiences not least because they’re easy to love, come with a following wind of consensus and their very presence on the bill guarantees a reliable performance of pleasure-giving.

Yet the things that move us most in the long run tend not to be the biggest, but the ones that feel like our own personal discoveries – and promise to be lifelong companions, in quiet times as well as high times. Nature reserves are a rich source of such discovery for walkers – a library with long shelves, full of lovinglycurated, sometimes obscure, often utterly transporting volumes.

But it’s one with a system of labelling that defies the casual browser. In England there are 229 National Nature Reserves (NNR), in Scotland 43 and in Wales 76. Then there are Local Nature Reserves (LNR) and England has 1662 of those; Scotland and Wales add 75 and 62 respectively. Then there are RSPB reserves, Wildlife Trust and National Trust reserves (and Sites of Special Scientific Interest, Special Protection Areas, Biospheres and Ramsar sites). Some places are more than one of these, i.e. an NNR and an RSPB reserve.

It can seem bewildering or it can seem bewitching, depending whether you see chaos or plenty in heaps of things. But the very hardto-graspness of the network hints at the truth – that what’s driven the creation of nature reserves isn’t a marketing impulse to drive human footfall, but a diverse range of groups and organisations, passionate people and enlightened leaders determined to put nature first, here in these precious acres. If national parks are our great, green lungs, nature reserves are caches of bottled oxygen liberally distributed for those who might need them. ▶

“Nature reserves are a rich source of discovery for walkers – a library with long shelves, full of utterly transporting volumes.”

BREATHE DEEP Holme Fen is one of eight reserves we visited in just one day out from CW’s headquarters – turn over to find out more and the keys to help you find your own.