Wildlife trust buys land to create new reserve

3 hours ago 30

Debbie Tubby,in Cley next the Seaand

Neve Gordon-Farleigh

Shaun Whitmore/BBC Eliot Lyne standing on the Cley Marshes nature reserve. He has short brown hair and is wearing glasses. He is wearing a green top and white shirt. There are plants and shrubs behind him, which are out of focus.

A wildlife trust celebrating its centenary has bought what will become a new nature reserve for £4.6m.

The Norfolk Wildlife Trust (NWT) was founded by Dr Sydney Long in 1926 after he purchased 435 acres of marsh at Cley next the Sea.

One hundred years on, NWT has announced it has purchased 336 acres of mostly arable land at Wood Norton, near its Foxley Wood site, after receiving £3.8m from the Natural England Nutrient Mitigation Scheme.

Eliot Lyne, its chief executive, said it was "one of the most significant habitat creation projects" in NWT's history.

Lyne said: "There are lots of challenges ahead.

"It's not a secret nature is in trouble. We have done our bit over the last 100 years to preserve and protect these amazing sites and now what we need to do is restore and recover.

"We need to have nature everywhere and we need to connect people with nature, we think we can do that.

"We have been doing it for 100 years and we can do it for another 100 years."

Since its founding, NWT has grown. It now has 5,500 hectares of nature reserves.

Shaun Whitmore/BBC Bernard Bishop, a man who is standing outside on the Cley Marshes reserve. The photograph has been taken on a foggy day with the background of the reserve difficult to make out clearly. He is wearing a grey jumper and chequered shirt with a black fleece over the top. He is looking directly at the camera and smiling.

One person who has witnessed NWT's growth first hand is assistant warden Bernard Bishop, who is following in his great-grandfather and father's footsteps.

He said: "One hundred years ago these marshes [at Cley] were purchased and my great-grandfather Robert Bishop was the keeper, or as they called it then, the watcher.

"In the 1930s, he retired and my father was appointed the warden-cum-keeper, and then I started to work and get paid by the trust in 1972 as his assistant.

"When he retired in 1979, I was lucky enough to become the warden here."

Norfolk Wildlife Trust A black-and-white photograph of Dr Sydney Long and Robert Bishop, Bernard Bishop's great-grandfather. They are standing next to an old lorry laden with what looks like turf.

When the Cley reserve first started issuing entry tickets, he said his mum would have handed them out, along with a cup of tea or a cake.

If she knew them, they would be invited for lunch.

He said: "It's unbelievable.

"Nobody will ever see the changes I've seen in the 70-plus years I have been here - going from a few visitors to 130,000 people visiting the centre and becoming probably, dare I say it, maybe the most famous nature reserve in the country.

"It's the foresight these people had. How did they see how it was going to become popular?"

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