Wildflowers at Meshaw Moor nature reserve
Northern Devon Natural Solutions
Northern Devon has lots of green space and is home to a wide array of wildlife. But recent decades have seen significant losses of wildlife-rich habitats.
Pressures on northern Devon’s farmland have resulted in declines of wildflowers, insects and birds among grasslands and hedges, while freshwater fish have been impacted by pollution in rivers and streams. Flood risk has also increased in recent years, and the impacts of climate change are likely to exacerbate all these problems.
But many farmers and landowners across northern Devon want to work with DWT to improve land and water for wildlife and people. That’s where the Northern Devon Natural Solutions project comes in.
It’s time to think big and use natural solutions to create, restore and connect wild spaces for nature.
Natural solutions - what we can offer landowners
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Zoe Hughes
How natural solutions can address climate change
Find out more
The Northern Devon Natural Solutions team will work with farmers and landowners to:
• allow rivers to return to their natural state to reduce flood risk
• restore wildflower-rich grasslands to benefit threatened butterflies and other wildlife
• create new areas of woodland
• encourage natural processes, ‘wilding’ areas of land to help tackle the climate and nature emergencies
Where are NDNS Land Advisers working?
The project focuses on land next to 36 watercourses within the Torridge and Taw catchments. Please click on the interactive map below, to see if you live within the project area.
Working with farmers and landowners
The Northern Devon Natural Solutions project works with farmers, land owners, land managers, communities and volunteers to take action benefiting Devon’s environment.
DWT land advisers can provide the support needed to implement solutions - working with nature to improve the wildlife, soil, water quality, flood management and carbon capture capacity of farms.
European eel, photo Jack Perks
Improving Devon’s Rivers
We are improving the water quality of our rivers and streams so that we can see populations of salmon, trout and eels recover and other aquatic wildlife thrive again.
Izzy Moser
Delivering Natural Solutions
In order to tackle the twin crises affecting our wildlife and climate, we must:
- allow rivers to return to their natural state to reduce flood risk
- restore northern Devon's iconic wildflower-rich grasslands
- create new areas of woodland
- develop 'wilded' areas of land to increase biodiversity, reduce flooding and capture carbon
Project aims
- Provide focused advice and support to 360 landowners and farmers to help them to use their land more sustainably
- Support landowners to access funding that will help to cover the costs involved in adopting nature friendly farming practices
- Develop a network of landowners, farmers and land managers across North Devon, to share knowledge and skills through a series of workshops, webinars and practical training
- Improve 90 km of riverbank for wildlife
- Improve 915 hectares of existing natural features for wildlife and create 180 hectares of new wildlife habitat
- Work with landowners to allow land to be 'wilded', to regenerate woodland to create a mosaic of carbon-storing tree cover and open grassland that is home to insects, birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians.
Further information
If you would like to find out more about the Northern Devon Natural Solutions project's activities, you can sign up to receive email updates by clicking here
Or contact Ewan Wallis, NDNS Project Manager, on ewallis@devonwildlifetrust.org
Funding
The Northern Devon Natural Solutions project is part funded through the Environment Agency's Water Environment Improvement Fund (WEIF) and the Natural Capital Challenge Fund via Devon County Council, with support from other partners and charitable trusts. Thanks to the additional support of Turnstyle Designs and The Naturesave Trust.
DWT needs to raise funds to support this project each year and we are very grateful to donors to our Rivers of Life appeal - you can still contribute to this appeal by clicking here
FAQs
Why focus on these waterbodies?
The project covers 36 sub-catchments of the Taw and Torridge rivers and northern Devon streams, which have been carefully selected through liaison with the North Devon Catchment Partnership and other partners.
The catchments have been identified as areas where water quality standards are failing, and where changes to land management would lead to improvement, within the lifetime of the project.
Will you work with farms outside of your target areas?
We are happy to speak with anyone in the locality of our catchment areas but we may not be able to offer all of the assistance that we would like. Please provide your details, including your postcode, and we will check.
Also, it is worth noting that you are very welcome to attend any events/workshops that we organise. You can keep up to date with planned activities for landowners and land managers in the area by signing up to our email list here