The charity is currently piloting a scheme to provide advice and funding, targeted at transforming areas of arable land adjacent to designated wildlife areas, into grassland. This will reduce carbon emissions, sequester Carbon, boost habitat connectivity and create more habitat for pollinators and farmland birds, whilst also maintaining farm incomes.

The project, funded by players of People’s Postcode Lottery, is aimed at converting arable land near to known wildlife sites – designated either Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) or Local Wildlife Sites (LWS) - to help buffer them from the impacts of climate change and to reduce problems caused by habitat fragmentation, giving nature a chance to recover.

The Trust has worked with Woodside Farm at Wellow and New Holbeck Farm at Hallam to convert seven hectares of arable land to a type of grassland, known as herb-rich leys, through a process known as arable reversion. The switch reduces the amount of carbon released from the soil each year during ploughing and sowing of crops and allows the soil to absorb carbon from the atmosphere over time.

Outlining the scale of the challenge Head of Nature Recovery Janice Bradley explained: “Not all areas of the country are suitable for large scale ‘re-wilding’ where land is given over almost exclusively to nature. In a county like Nottinghamshire, we have to find innovative farmer-facing solutions to help tackle the nature and climate crises, while still enabling them to run profitable businesses sustainably, and to continue to meet our need as a nation, for home-grown food.”

The environment created by these herb-rich leys provides valuable habitats for bees and other pollinators and can benefit farmland birds such as grey partridge and yellowhammer - currently species of conservation concern. Linking the leys to adjacent SSSIs and LWS, increases the mosaic of high-quality interconnected habitats within the Nature Recovery Network, an ecologically coherent, resilient network of sites that will enable nature to recover and thrive. This provides opportunities for species to expand and migrate within the network and is of particular value to species that find it difficult to travel between sites to extend their range.  

Speaking about the potential of the piloted approach, Farming & Wildlife Projects Officer Lisa Channing explained: “To stand a chance of putting nature into recovery over the next decade 30% of our landscape needs to be welcoming for wildlife. In a county like Nottinghamshire, where less than 8% of land is managed primarily for nature conservation, this means finding ways to encourage nature-friendly farming whilst supporting successful farm businesses.”

The pilot builds on the Trust’s long experience of working with farmers and complements a range of farm-focussed initiatives currently being delivered by the charity in partnership with Severn Trent. Across the county, Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust is working with dozens of farmers to promote nature-based solutions to challenges such as improving soil health, reducing pesticides and fertiliser pollution in water courses and finding ways to reconnect fragmented habitats.

The Wildlife Trust is working to highlight how nature-based solutions can help

• Capture and store carbon
• Reduce greenhouse gas emissions
• Reduce run-off of fertilisers into watercourses
• Reduce water and air pollution
• Boost biodiversity
• Contribute to Nature Recovery Networks

Giving more details of the new pilot Lisa added: “Profitable cultivation of crops has previously resulted in year-on-year disturbance of soils causing stored carbon to be released into the atmosphere. When crops are treated with nitrogen-based fertilizers and pesticides yet more carbon is released and there is also a risk that chemicals will leach into nearby watercourses. Reverting arable fields to herb-rich leys delivers significant benefit in terms of reducing carbon emissions and boosting carbon storage. By carefully targeting land we can also maximise the impact of habitat creation by buffering and reconnecting remaining fragments of habitat.”

The carbon reductions are further enhanced as reversion to herb-rich leys reduces and often eliminates the need for pesticides and fertilisers.

As it seeks to find effective ways to encourage nature-friendly farming, Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust has identified the challenge of convincing arable famers to take productive land out of use as a major barrier to increasing the area of nature friendly habitat in a county with so much high value farmland.

The pilot programme includes a package of support and advice to farmers to help them change their farming practices and convert land to grassland to help bring about nature’s recovery. This has included undertaking wildlife surveys and providing materials such as seed and fencing.

The Trust has also brought together support from complementary schemes to deliver almost 2km of new hedgerows, features such as beetle banks, the installation of bird and bat boxes, supplementary feeding opportunities for birds and maximising opportunities for carbon sequestration and species recovery through the creation of a network of high-value habitats.

Lisa added: “The pilot has provided a foot in the door where other schemes may not have been attractive or practicable for these farm businesses. Many farmers are understandably nervous of permanently taking land out of production to create new habitat such as woodlands or wetlands, but by creating habitat that is beneficial for wildlife whilst also being available for grazing by cattle, sheep or ponies, we’ve demonstrated that real results to tackle the nature and climate crisis can be achieved very quickly.”

Speaking about their positive experience of the scheme Richard Baugh of Woodside Farm, Wellow, said “At Woodside farm we had been trying to find a scheme to suit what we wanted as well as helping improve our soils and encourage more wildlife for a while and have struggled to find one to fit. We felt that the Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust scheme fitted well with what we wanted and Lisa and the team have been really helpful. The trial has taken place on a field bordering a SSSI, where we had struggled with arable crops over 2 wet years. We felt the field needed to be refreshed, the soil needed improving to help with water logging and a 5-year herbal ley should help with these.

The scheme has also supported us to fence the field to protect the SSSI from our grazing animals and we’ve seen results in just six months and managed correctly the herbal ley will help the soil and boost wildlife by increasing the number of beneficial beetles – meaning we can start to eradicate insecticides from the farm. With the fencing having a 30 year guarantee it’s an investment we will feel the rewards from for a long time on our farm.  

The Trust hopes that the partnerships with landowners will grow over time – and further woodland and hedgerow planting is already scheduled, funded via the Nottinghamshire County Council Trees for Climate Fund next winter.

In the coming month, surveys of invertebrates and breeding birds will be compared with earlier records and the benefits of the scheme will be promoted to other farmers at an event scheduled for the spring when the leys will be well established.

With public funding for landowners increasingly being targeted towards nature-friendly farming, the Trust will also push for the inclusion of the approach in the Government’s Environmental Land Management Scheme (ELMS) initiatives from 2024 onwards. If included, the approach could provide a viable income stream for farmers whilst creating nature-based solutions to help support nature’s recovery and help to limit the impact of the climate crisis.