We all want a world where our climate is stable, nature thrives, and where all people have health, happiness, and prosperity – it’s our human right, right?
Unless we change things, we are on track to breach the 1.5°C temperature increase limit set by the Paris Agreement by 2030. The breach risks irreversible environmental degradation and runaway climate change that will affect all our societies and economies.
An essential ally against the climate crisis is nature. We are losing nature at an alarming and unprecedented rate.
If you want to make some changes at home to protect nature, boosting the biodiversity in your garden or outdoor space is a great place to start.
Biodiversity and climate are inextricably linked, you can’t fix one without the other. Help wildlife to thrive in your garden.
Sussex Green Living’s Youth Eco Forum is a young persons’ environmental group where we speak about current news and creatively demonstrate climate activism in many forms. The YEF was founded in June 2020 in the hope of connecting like-minded teenagers to make a difference for our planet during a period of disconnection… so we started […]
Imagine a beautiful Persian carpet. Then cut it into a thousand squares. What do you get? Not a thousand smaller Persian carpets but a thousand scraps of cloth unravelling at the edges. That’s what’s happening to nature in the modern landscape, the scraps becoming ever smaller as the threads begin to trip us up. It is causing the Sixth Mass Extinction – a catastrophic loss of biodiversity affecting the whole planet.
We can see the unravellings all around us if we know how to look. A patch of ancient woodland surrounded by a monoculture of arable is vulnerable to ‘edge effect’ – the drift of chemical sprays, exposure to wind, extreme heat and frost – eating away at habitat on its periphery. That single ancient oak in the middle of a field of wheat has its roots assaulted by ploughing every year. The fine fungal filaments – or mycorrhizae – leading off its roots in search of nutrients are drenched several times a year in agricultural chemicals. The tree can no longer communicate underground with other trees. It is like a lone elephant in a zoo, deprived of the society of its herd, doomed to die alone. Read more
The new kelp forest off the Sussex coast is becoming real. That’s the message from Councillors and wildlife and fisheries experts. And it puts Sussex in the forefront of efforts to combat global warming, habitat destruction and the return to a cleaner, more sustainable world.
The marine forest which stretched between Chichester and Rye was destroyed by storms and trawling in the 1980s but is now being restored.
“Given the extent of kelp loss it may take many years for kelp to recover to the density and distribution once known”, says Tim Dapling, Chief Officer for Sussex Inshore Fisheries and Conservation Authority. “Early information appears to show changes in the environment already taking place since trawling management was introduced in March 2021. It will be very interesting to see changes in 4-5 years time.” Read more
Seals on our Sussex coast show that conservationists are getting something right. It’s not just Gavin the well-loved harbour seal who sports with paddle boarders in Littlehampton; we can see these marvellous creatures now in Chichester harbour, Eastbourne and in the Adur, where two seals named Bramble and Rivier (who swam in from Belgium) have generated their own following.
According to Zoologist Stephen Savage of the Sea Watch Foundation, it’s a wonderful sign that our waters are clean enough to support food for these large animals. “They like mullet, flatfish and crabs mainly” he explains, “but they hunt anywhere in tidal or brackish water, even as far up as The Black Rabbit at Arundel.”
Stephen, who is County Recorder for Sea Mammals, has studied seals since 1997. The public have been stalwart supporters. Initially he collated sighting reports, but eight years ago increasing seal numbers allowed him to build a picture of populations in Sussex. “We hope to learn even more through citizen science” says Stephen. “The interaction of seals and people will significantly add to this story.” Read more
On Wednesday 14th July, Sussex Green Living’s Youth Eco Forum led a day of outdoor activities in an area of ancient woodland near Billingshurst. The event, named Beyond Be-Leaf, hoped to give young people who would not usually have the opportunity to get out in the countryside a chance to get hands-on and creative, learning about the natural world. Youth Eco Forum Member, Flora Burleigh reflected that the best thing about the day was, “simply observing the students as they were immersed in nature, watching them be inspired and actually having the opportunity to pay a closer attention to the woodland environment.”
Year 7 and 8 pupils from Tanbridge House School, Christ’s Hospital School and City of London Academy Southwark spent the day learning about the local wildlife, woodland management, and positive climate solutions. They had the opportunity to explore their connection to nature through creative writing and dance workshops as well as learning woodcraft skills and going on a nature walk. Some of the young attendees had never been to the countryside before and this made the event a particularly exciting and revelatory experience. Read more
Keith Colin at Sompting
Earlier this month I had the great pleasure of being shown around two of the four sites managed by Keith and Liane who, along with a great team of trustees run the charity Sustainable Sussex.
Volunteer Fiona, who lives in a flat 20 minute’s bike ride away, told me, “I’ve been helping for two years now. It was a real lifesaver during lockdown!”
The small area (it’s less than one acre) is rich in birdsong – all the more noticeable as there is little or no traffic noise. The scent of elderflower blossoms fills the air as swallows swoop low over the small fields. Read more
Female Orange tip
Dave Goulson is Professor of Biology at the University of Brighton. His books, include ‘The Garden Jungle’ and ‘Gardening for Bumblebees’.
At a recent talk, he explained that we need insects to pollinate our food crops. In the UK some growers are now employing people to hand-pollinate their plants, because insect numbers have declined so dramatically.
We can help here though. The area of gardens across England is over 4.5 times that of national nature reserves, so by gardening for nature together we can make a difference.
As part of the CPRE Sussex ‘Festival of Spring’, Prof Goulson explained how we can garden to save the planet: Read more
Why not learn your A – Z of Common British Garden Birds We are all becoming more acquainted with our homes and gardens. We have rediscovered the simple pleasures of watching the birds come in and out of our space. If you have found yourself becoming something of a twitcher, you might want to […]
WE PAY FOR FOOD AND WATER WHY NOT FOR AIR? Every one of us depends on oxygen without ever questioning where it comes from. Almost half the oxygen we breathe comes from the oceans and the other half from plant life. Whilst millions of tiny trees are being planted, old intact ancient forests full of […]
Our Horsham Climate Cafe on 5th September was an inspiring and informative talk about Wildlife Friendly Gardening. Every green space is critical for our wildlife, even your garden, as all our UK gardens form more space than all the UK nature reserves!
Carrie the founder of Sussex Green Living opened the event with a reminder that we humans are not at the top of a wildlife pyramid but are simply part of the web of all life. All the living things in an ecosystem depend on all the other things – living and non-living for continued survival – for food supplies and other needs. Humans, animals and plants depend on a complex system of food for survival. Stressing the importance of using bug hotels, bird boxes and bat boxes in our gardens, but be aware that bats need about 1,000 mosquito type insects per hour, so a pond is almost essential!
Joanne Knowles was our second speaker who is passionate about encouraging us all to seek out peat -free compost. Read more
The Keep Rookwood Green bio blitz on Saturday 15th August was an outstanding success which a stream of timed arrivals of families who went to record the wildlife. The council plan to build 1,100 new houses on Roowood Golf Course, which is located next to Horsham’s nature reserve, this area makes up 28% of Horsham’s large green space. This wildlife-rich natural world is vital for our wellbeing and survival, once built on it is lost and gone forever.
You can listen to the talk by Keep Rookwood Green and see their presentation here.
People are being encouraged to write to their councillors, sign the Keep Rookwood Green petition and carry out their own bio blitz on a day which suits you and any friends or family members. Use this map and log to plot your finds, take photos and share them in the social media with this hashtag #foundonrookwood. You can find Keep Rookwood Green social media details and the petition on this page. Read more
Join the Keep Rookwood Green Campaign on Saturday 15th August to become citizen scientists at this bio blitz, help carry out surveys to help record all living species in the area. You can book timed tickets for staggered visits through this Eventbrite link or learn more here www.KeepRookWoodGreen.org.
Watch the talk Keep Rookwood Green gave at our Horsham Future Forum meeting on Tuesday 16th June here.
HELP KEEP ROOKWOOD GREEN PLEASE!
On Tuesday 16th June our weekly Horsham Future Forum and Youth Eco Forum attendees listened to an excellent talk by Peter Simpson, Trustee of the Friends of Warnham Local Nature Reserve and Sally Sanderson, Chair of Friends of Horsham Park. Friends of Warnham Local Nature Reserve, Friends of Horsham Park and the Horsham Society have formed Keep Rookwood Green Alliance and are campaigning to retain Rookwood Golf Course as a public green space.
Those of us on this week’s Zoom call were shocked to learn of the ecological damage and the 29% loss of Horsham’s large green space that will occur if 1,100 houses are built on Rookwood Golf Course. The decision will be finalised before August and there is a short window of opportunity in which we can influence Horsham District Councillors. The more of us that make our views known known, the greater the chance that we will be heard and that we can Keep Rookwood Green!
Here are some ways that you can get involved: Read more
Wool and gardening….. Really? Yup Really!
One of the last hidden treasure/locations
Saturday 9th May the weekly virtual Horsham Climate Cafe focused on The Value of Nature, bringing attendees a special message from Nicola Peel who is locked down in a cloud forest in Los Cedros Biological Reserve in the Choco region of Ecuador full of yet to be discovered plant and animals. Plants which will provide cures to diseases, trees which give us oxygen to breath, things we take for granted. The debate is gold and copper mining for new phones or medicine and oxygen?
During this Climate Cafe session Victoria Wyllie de Echeverria also gave an informal talk about the deep connection indigenous people have to nature, their stewardship of the land and water and how they are adapting to climate change.
You can see Nicola’s video message at the bottom of this page. Learn here about Nicola’s lockdown location, one of the most biologically diverse and endemic habitats on Earth in her latest email:
Dear friends,
After finishing my work in the Ecuadorian Amazon I was about to have a week to myself on the coast. This was not to be. Like so many of us due to the unforeseen events our lives have changed.
I had returned to Quito and was staying with a friend when I heard that due to Corona Virus all borders were closed, flights to be cancelled and no more buses. I got out of the city on the last bus to Chontal and headed up to the Los Cedros Reserve. http://reservaloscedros.org/
Los Cedros Reserve – Andean cloud forest of Ecuador – UNDER THREAT
Our friend Nicola Peel has sent us an update and some incredible photos from her visit to the Los Cedros Reserve in the cloud forest of Ecuador which is now threatened by gold, copper and molybdenum mining.
Sylvian Cleymans