Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Making a difference – by supporting charities
There is no better way to ensure you are helping wildlife than by joining one of our many conservation charities. Charlie Elder takes a look at some of those well worth supporting
While we can all do our bit for the environment – whether it be recycling, putting up a bird box in the garden, buying organic veg or trying to reduce plastic waste – there is only so much difference we can make as individuals.
Collectively the actions of everyone add up, but it can feel as if one’s personal efforts fall well short of what is needed, given the perilous declines in our wildlife and the urgent and large scale remedies required.
The answer – at least my answer – is to support those organisations with the campaigning clout, the conservation know-how and the land holdings to effect real change for the better.
For less than the cost of a meal out (remember those?) one can pay the price of a subscription fee to join a charity that will make a real difference.
But which to join? There are innumerable UK organisations worth considering, covering everything from saving seahorses and boosting bumblebees to aiding amphibians and helping hedgehogs.
Take your pick if you have a specialist interest – and I list a few at the end of this article.
However, if you want to simply put your money into a conservation charity that takes a broader approach then here are a few of the big hitters to join.
RSPB – UK’S LARGEST NATURE CONSERVATION CHARITY
The charity’s logo, an avocet, may look like a dainty species, with its graceful features and upturned bill. But this emblem of a conservation success story is actually a tough and territorial bird that is not afraid of a good scrap.
As such it is the perfect mascot for the organisation, symbolising the contrasting caring and campaigning characteristics that have helped the RSPB endure for over 130 years, attract more than a million members and make such a significant contribution to conservation. It is an organisation that shares a public affection for wildlife, yet is tough enough to fight doggedly on its behalf.
Founded in 1889 by women who shared a revulsion at the use of wild bird plumes in the fashion industry, the charity successfully campaigned for the passing of the Plumage Bill banning imports in 1921 – thanks in no small part to newly-elected Plymouth MP Nancy Astor, the first woman MP to take her seat in Parliament.
Today the RSPB works to promote conservation and the protection of birds and the wider environment through public awareness campaigns, petitions and its more than 200 nature reserves throughout the United Kingdom.
Its focus has broadened beyond birds over time to embrace nature as a whole – its membership magazine even changing its title from Birds to Nature’s Voice.
If you have an interest in the conservation of a broad spectrum of nature, and support the protection of habitats through carefully managed reserves and value a campaigning voice standing up for biodiversity and the environment, then the RSPB is excellent value for its modest membership fee.
WILDLIFE TRUSTS – CHAMPIONING A LOCAL LOVE OF NATURE
The Wildlife Trusts is a federation of 46 local wildlife trusts covering the whole of the UK. By joining a local branch, say Devon Wildlife Trust, you are supporting conservation work in your own back yard, and can get involved with local wildlife projects.
Between them the Wildlife Trusts have a combined membership of over 850,000 and look after more than 2,300 nature reserve, large and small, covering around 243,000 acres in total. Trusts also organise volunteer activities, with tens of thousands taking part.
Its underlying philosophy is that we depend on nature, and it depends on us, and that everyone should have the opportunity to experience the joy of wildlife in their daily lives as part of a healthy natural world rich in biodiversity – issues upon which the charity lobbies decision-makers.
The Wildlife Trusts movement began life as The Society for the Promotion of Nature Reserves formed in 1912 with a view to purchase the country’s best wildlife sites for protection as nature reserves, going through several name changes over the decades and eventually in 2002 becoming The Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts.
Each Trust is an independent charity, but all share a vision of people close to nature with land and seas rich in wildlife.
If you want to support the work of an organisation working on behalf of nature, both locally and nationally, then the Wildlife Trusts is a top choice – and their myriad reserves well worth visiting. > Rivers of wildflowers as part of a ‘B-Lines’ network created by Buglife to connect habitats
Of course if you want to conserve wildlife you need to start from the ground up – with the right habitat, and plenty of it.
The Woodland Trust is the largest woodland conservation charity in the UK, concerned with the creation, protection and restoration of native woodland heritage, and has planted
50 million trees since 1972 – when it was first founded in Devon, with its first purchase being part of the Avon Valley Woods, near Kingsbridge. It aims to protect and restore ancient woodland, which is rare, unique and irreplaceable, and plant native trees and woods with the aim of creating resilient landscapes for people and wildlife.
The Woodland Trust maintains ownership of over 1,000 sites covering more than
24,700 hectares, with a third of this being ancient woodland, and ensures public access to its woods. It has 500,000 members and supporters.
Its stated vision is “a UK rich in native woods and trees, for people and wildlife”, and its focus is on the protection and creation of native woodland.
Love woods and the wildlife they support? Then this is the charity to join.
NATIONAL TRUST – CONSERVATION ON A GRAND SCALE
They don’t come much bigger than the National Trust. One of the largest landowners in the United Kingdom, the 125-year-old Trust owns over 610,000 acres of land and 780 miles of coast and has more than five million members.
The organisation is, of course, well known for the heritage sites is owns, with its historic properties attracting huge numbers of visitors – lockdown restrictions permitting. But it is also dedicated to natural landscapes and habitats as well, with its open spaces being free to visit.
Of course its sites are home to plenty of wildlife, from the woodlands of Lydford Gorge at the western edge of Dartmoor to the estate at Saltram near Plymouth and the coastal bays at Wembury in south Devon and Polperro in Cornwall.
So by supporting the Trust one is also helping ensure a future for nature at its numerous and well-managed sites.
BUGLIFE – THINKING SMALL TO MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE
This may seem like a less familiar name among the giants of conservation organisations, but this charity is growing in prominence by tackling something at the heart of saving nature: declines in insect life.
Whether acting as pollinators or providing food for species further up the food chain, invertebrates are vital to a thriving environment – and include some of our most stunning and charismatic species, from butterflies to bumblebees.
As Buglife says: “Invertebrates are vitally important to a healthy planet – humans and other life forms could not survive without them. The food we eat, the fish we catch, the birds we see, the flowers we smell and the hum of life we hear, simply would not exist without bugs. Invertebrates underpin life on earth and without them the world’s ecosystems would collapse.”
There are more than 40,000 invertebrate species in the UK, and many of these are under threat as never before. Buglife – the Invertebrate Conservation Trust works to save Britain’s rarest little animals, everything from bees to beetles, worms to woodlice and jumping spiders to jellyfish, raising awareness about their plight, campaigning for protection and environmental legislation and undertaking practical projects in the field.
PLENTY OF OTHERS TO CHOOSE FROM
If butterflies are important to you (and why wouldn’t they be?) then Butterfly Conservation, founded in 1968, is an excellent charity, with dozens of reserves and tens of thousands of members. And for bee-lovers then the Bumblebee Conservation Trust is worth joining, working as it does to tackle the plight facing these vital pollinators, while the British Dragonfly Society is the one for you if you love these fascinating insects.
In terms of mammals there is the Mammal Society, established in 1954, and also the Bat Conservation Trust, which has more than 5,600 members and closely monitors the fortunes of our 18 species. Also worth considering is the Vincent Wildlife Trust, which works to turn around the fortunes of specific endangered British mammals, such as the water vole.
The Marine Conservation Society is the UK’s leading marine environment not-for-profit organisation, campaigning since it was formed 30 years ago for the health of our seas and the life they contain, focusing on everything from pollution and protected areas to sustainable fisheries.
The Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust, founded in 1946, is an established conservation organisation with over 200,000 members and ten reserves with visitor centres, and lobbies on wetland and conservation issues world-wide. Continuing the bird theme, the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) is an organisation dedicated to studying our birds.
And there are plenty more worth considering, including the People’s Trust for Endangered Species, which carries out surveys and is a champion of the hazel dormouse; Froglife and Amphibian and Reptile Conservation; the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, helping improve the fortunes of grey partridges and hares among other species; Plantlife and the Freshwater Habitats Trust, to name but a small selection.
Why not treat yourself, and our wildlife, by joining a few.