Upper Thames Living Landscape

Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust’s new Nature Recovery Network (NRN) maps our ambition to see 30% of land across these three counties well managed for nature by 2030.  It represents joined-up areas across our three counties that are important for wildlife - beyond our own nature reserves and Living Landscape areas. It will be used as a strategic decision-support tool to guide where we prioritise our conservation activities, such as where best to: acquire new nature reserves (e.g., to protect high value habitats, and to restore or rewild land for new schemes like biodiversity offsetting); develop new landscape scale conservation projects; and target our wildlife and land management advice in agricultural landscapes.

The Nature Recovery Network surrounds priority areas where we have been working hard to support nature’s recovery for decades – our Living Landscapes. Within our Living Landscapes we have been acquiring land, and working with landowners, farmers, councils and other stakeholders to deliver projects that support nature’s recovery and connect people with nature. A great success story has been the conversion of arable land to form part of the Chimney Meadows Nature Reserve, in the Upper Thames Living Landscape. The benefits to people and nature from this work far outweigh the costs of restoration and have been estimated to be four times higher than those delivered from the previous agricultural operation. You can read more about the nature-based solutions created at Chimney Meadows here.