Staying Connected event: Conserving nature and boosting biodiversity by greening your community spaces

On Tuesday 12 September 2023 @ 17:00 hrs Cambridgeshire ACRE, the local rural development charity, is hosting an online session via Zoom exploring how communities can make use of their outdoor spaces to help boost their local wildlife, creating a more diverse, wildlife friendly local environment.

The event “Conserving nature and boosting biodiversity by greening your community spaces” is part of their ‘Staying Connected’ series, which aims to bring together learning around rural best practice including community projects, case studies, latest research findings and new innovations.

At the session, Cambridgeshire ACRE staff will share experience gained and lessons learnt from delivering “New Life on the Old West”, the organisation’s major landscape conservation project. They also aim to provide ideas and inspiration for creating and managing new wildlife habitat, recruiting volunteers and engaging people with the natural world around them. There will also be time for discussion about attendees’ own communities’ needs around the topic area.

New Life on the Old West is delivering wildlife habitat enhancements in green spaces and surrounding countryside within areas close to the Old West River in the Cambridgeshire fens. A map of the project area is shared below, hover over it to see more details.

The project takes its name from the Old West River — the part of the Great Ouse flowing east from Earith, at the southern end of the 21 miles long Ouse Washes. From Earith, the river meanders through the countryside, until it reaches its confluence with the lower Cam and Ely Ouse just south of Stretham travelling a large part through East Cambridgeshire.