EARLIER this year, an unexpected opportunity arose to acquire 11 acres of New Forest woodland and heathland known as Sandy Down.

Thanks to the fantastic generosity of our members and other supporters we were able to raise the necessary funds to buy the potentially wildlife-rich but currently neglected site in just a few short weeks.

Sandy Down is located close to our Roydon Woods Wildlife Reserve just south of Brockenhurst. It has a mosaic of dry and wet heathland communities that are very valuable for wildlife, and which have the potential to support key species such as cross-leaved heath, bog asphodel, round-leaved sundew and heath spotted orchid.

However, despite its conservation importance, it is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), the site had suffered from more than 30 years of neglect.

An assessment by Natural England described it as being in ‘unfavourable and declining’ condition with invading undesirable species such as purple moor grass, birch and bracken threatening the heathland flora and fauna.

Without proper conservation management the wildlife interest could have been lost and we could have seen the SSSI protection disappear.

However, thanks to donations from charitable trusts and the generosity of our members and local residents we have been able to raise the money needed to buy and manage it.

Although Sandy Down is not a large site it contains some of the fastest disappearing lowland habitats in the UK. It also has a nature conservation value that goes beyond its immediate boundary. Its proximity to Roydon Woods means that it can become a vital stepping stone for wildlife, enabling key species such as the small pearlbordered fritillary butterfly found at Roydon Woods to spread out to the wider New Forest. Unfavourable habitats are barriers to the spread of wildlife species, causing population numbers to stay low and possibly disappear altogether. As such Sandy Down has value as a demonstration of our new living landscapes approach to nature conservation.

Living landscapes are the Wildlife Trust’s vision of what successful wildlife conservation looks like.

They are areas of wildlife-rich habitat that provide excellent opportunities for wildlife to spread out and adapt to changing environmental conditions and for people to enjoy the countryside.

Such living landscapes are created when we connect up our reserves with each other by ensuring that the land in between is managed in as wildlife-friendly a way as possible. To achieve this we work with other landowners to help them see the benefits of managing their land to support more wildlife and by influencing local planning policies in order to see that avoidable damaging activities do not happen. These ‘natural connections’ allow space for wildlife to move from one area to another and to thrive. This is a longterm vision and may take many years to achieve, but examples like Sandy Down show what can be done.