The OPAL Grants Scheme aims to help natural history societies and recording schemes grow and flourish. To date we have distributed grants totaling £175,000 to over 70 different natural history groups, and another 22 projects have recently been selected for funding as part of the fourth round of the scheme, which is focusing on projects that will improve the way natural history groups can work in the long term, enabling them to continue and expand their work in the future.
Successful groups
Bat Conservation Trust
Grant awarded: £ 3000
Project: Recruiting and training more volunteers to take part in bat detector surveys, and supporting existing volunteers as part of the National Bat Monitoring Programme. This will involve running four Field Survey training sessions and four Waterway Survey training sessions for recording Daubenton’s bats.
Website: www.bats.org.uk
British Arachnological Society
Grant awarded: £ 2719
Project: Introducing British spiders to the wider public via an improved and more professional presence at large public events (such as the Amateur Entomological Society Exhibition) and a series of spider identification workshops, using new survey and presentation equipment purchased by the grant. This equipment will also be used to enhance the BAS annual field meeting for members.
Website: wiki.britishspiders.org.uk
British Entomological and Natural History Society
Grant awarded: £ 1879
Project: Purchase of digital imaging equipment for use in teaching, identification demonstrations, and image capture of terrestrial invertebrates for members and affiliated groups of the Society, to facilitate access to collections and expertise for ‘beginner’ entomologists and help more experienced entomologists tackle difficult to identify groups of insects.
Website: www.benhs.org.uk
British Phycological Society
Grant awarded: £ 1626
Project: Capturing the algae- an online recording portal for seaweeds to enable anyone to enter seaweed records. Contributors will enter recorder's name, species, date, place, level of certainty of identification, habitat information and photos that may help in verification. Data will be stored at the Biological Records Centre and be freely available through the NBN Gateway. The grant will also pay for laboratory hire as part of the BPS field meeting, enabling collection of verified species records by experts.
Website: www.brphycsoc.org
Buglife
Grant awarded: £707
Project: Bugs for all – Increasing the outreach capacity of the newly established South West Team through the purchase of collecting equipment and identification guides, and the delivery of an exciting and interactive series of public bug walks, bug hunts, school events, and invertebrate identification workshops.
Website: www.buglife.org.uk
Carlisle Natural History Society
Grant awarded: £ 3000
Project: Establishing a Local Natural History Resource Centre for Cumbria in partnership with Tullie House Museum and Cumbria Biodiversity Data Centre. This will be a resource free to use by CNHS members and other individuals and naturalists, particularly members of other local natural history societies, Cumbria University and recording groups from across the county.
Website: www.carlislenats.org.uk
Cheshire Active Naturalists
Grant awarded: £ 2450
Project: The CAN Roadshow! The grant will pay for the purchase of a range of equipment, tools and materials to allow the society to bring nature to the general public in the Cheshire region, and help promote the society's activities in a unique and colourful way, pass on the group’s enthusiasm for natural history, and encourage wider participation in nature and its study.
Website: www.cheshireactivenaturalists.org.uk
Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Federation for Biological Recorders (CISFBR)
Grant awarded: £ 2634
Project: The grant will pay for the purchase of a ruggedized tablet pc to be used at organized field biological recording events in Cornwall. The project is collaboration between CISFBR, the Botanical Cornwall Group, the Cornwall branch of Butterfly Conservation, and the Cornwall Fungus Recording Group. Each group organizes a programme of events every year, and the tablet pc will be equipped with a range of ID resources guides and electronic books and papers dealing with Cornish natural history, to significantly enhance biological recording in the field. It will also allow direct input into regional biological recording databases.
Website: www.cisfbr.org.uk
Cornwall Mammal Group
Grant awarded: £ 1500
Project: The grant will help fund the final development of the Cornwall Mammal Atlas, and its distribution throughout the county, including a launch event to promote the Atlas and the group, as well as showcase other local groups. The Atlas represents five years of monitoring and surveying, and will be used as a tool to encourage a more general interest Cornish Mammals, as well as target research and conservation efforts in the region.
Website: www.cornwallmammalgroup.co.uk
Dipterists Forum
Grant awarded: £ 3000
Project: The completion of line drawings for the Book, 'British Craneflies' authored by Alan Stubbs, as part of the 'British Flies' series. These drawings will be of great use in the successful identification of craneflies, and once published, the book will help stimulate the recording and study of the taxa, support the work of the Cranefly Recording Scheme, and of the Dipterists Forum.
Website: www.dipteristsforum.org.uk
Dorset Mammal Group
Grant awarded: £ 2800
Project: Launching the Dorset Mammal Group and extending species recording within the county. After forming from the coming together of the Dorset Badger Group and Dorset Otter Group, the aim of the group is to build a larger membership and acquire expertise to improve the effectiveness of mammal surveys within Dorset. The grant will help maximise the impact of the proposed launch events in 2013, by enhancing the public presence and recording capacity of the group.
Earthworm Society of Britain
Grant awarded: £ 892
Project: Establishing an earthworm recording scheme and training of new earthworm recorders. In order to address gaps in current distribution maps, the Society will create an earthworm recording scheme to facilitate easy recording and collating of knowledge of earthworms, and increase the number of recorders. The grant will fund 20 earthworm recording hire packs, containing equipment to collect and preserve specimens, and will help promote recording as simple, fun and accessible, to encourage long term earthworm monitoring.
Website: www.earthwormsoc.org.uk
EcoSoc
Grant awarded: £ 2713
Project: Magic moths – The project aims to initiate a long term moth recording program to assess moth diversity and abundance at a local nature reserve and adjacent reservoir. This will be achieved by conducting bi-weekly moth surveys, open to anyone, and actively promoted in the region. The project will be launched with a moth-focussed Bioblitz, and the grant will help to promote and publicise the event, as well as purchase specialised moth surveying equipment.
Essex Bat Group
Grant awarded: £ 2779
Project: The Weald Park Bat Project aims to pass on the skills and expertise of the experienced members of the Essex bat group, and the specialist knowledge that has been acquired of bat activity in Weald Park. The purchase of new survey equipment will allow more members of the public and bat group members than ever before to learn about the species present and to develop their own skills. The project will be centred around a number of public events, repeat field surveys at Weald Park, and a series of sound analysis training workshops.
Website: www.essexbatgroup.org.uk
Friends of Aston's Eyot
Grant awarded: £ 937
Project: The group carries out regular wildlife events and surveying on the wildlife hotspot of Aston's Eyot. These have been very successful, and the group plans to continue and enhance these with the acquisition of new survey equipment. It will also allow the group to continue the successful monitoring programme in the long term, run in conjunction with habitat management and restoration work on the island. A sharing equipment scheme established with other wildlife groups further increases the benefit of the equipment purchased.
Website: http://friendsofastonseyot.org.uk
Hampshire Amphibian & Reptile Group
Grant awarded: £ 700
Project: The group will provide several opportunities for members to engage in long-term monitoring at five separate sites across the region, with participation from both new and more experienced members. The project will not only develop the natural history and recording skills of those taking part, but will also generate regular reptile records which will help focus and direct management plans and conservation efforts in the region. The grant will pay for training of new recorders, as well as equipment required for surveys.
Isle of Wight Ringing Group
Grant awarded: £ 1767
Project: The group aim to use bird ringing as a way of engaging scouts on the Isle of Wight with birds and science. Working with the Scout Association on the island, and using their facilities at Corf Camp, the project will give young people the opportunity to see bird ringing in action, by running a number of education sessions to the high numbers of scouts that attend the camp over the year. The grant will pay for the equipment required to deliver the project successfully and ensure a high quality experience for the scouts, to be repeated in years to come.
Harvestman Recording Scheme (in partnership with the British Arachnological Society)
Grant awarded: £ 841
Project: The Recording Scheme plans to develop identification and training resources for UK harvestmen in order to increase the number of participants in the Harvestman Recording Scheme, and improve the level of identification. This will require the translation of the excellent Dutch resource for Harvestmen, ‘De Nederlandse hooiwagens (Opiliones)’ by Hay Wijnhoven into English by creating a free to down load PDF translation of the text to use in conjunction with the book. This will provide an excellent, cost-effective means of improving the existing identification of harvestmen in Britain.
The Mammal Society
Grant awarded: £ 2381
Project: Small Mammal Trapping Support – The Society already operates a very popular trap loan scheme, sending out Longworth traps to local mammal groups, students and training centres. However, these traps are expensive, and so the Society plan to build up a store of the new, cheaper Tube Trap which has been successfully tested in field trials and which is lighter to carry than the Longworths. This will lead to a significant increase in traps available to be loaned out by groups for their own trapping projects, which ultimately feed back to The Mammal Society’s records.
Website: www.mammal.org.uk
The National Sawfly Recording Scheme (in partnership with the Lancashire & Cheshire Entomological Society)
Grant awarded: £ 3000
Project: Establishment of a national sawfly recording scheme website, incorporating a 'Garden Sawfly Survey'. Sawflies are an under-studied group of insects and few resources are available for people taking an interest in them. The grant will fund a website for the recording scheme, and bring together resources to help users interpret identification keys, receive new information in news bulletins, and view images, generalised distributions and biological accounts of the British species. In addition members will have the opportunity to record, rear and study sawflies in their own gardens and submit their findings to the site as part of the Garden Sawfly Survey.
Worcestershire Bat Group
Grant awarded: £ 1382
Project: Worcestershire iBats Project – This involves the semi automated data collection of bat calls around the region based around a time expansion bat detector, GPS and recording system, which is attached to a car. Although data collection is passive, the analysis provides excellent opportunities for members to develop their bat call identification skills. The project will help increase data on the distribution of bat species in the county, and will increase opportunities for practical participation of members.
Website: www.worcestershirebats.btck.co.uk
Yorkshire Naturalists Union
Grant awarded: £ 1590
Project: Online Biological Recording – In an attempt to improve data flow within the YNU, an Indicia-based online recording portal is to be created within the YNU’ website. This will facilitate the efficient collection, verification and dissemination of records, and enable members and other volunteer recorders in Yorkshire to enter records of any taxon into a single portal. The records will be stored at the local Biological Records Centre, and verification of records will be possible via the iRecord website. Verified records will be made available to Local Environmental Records Centres, national recording schemes and the wider public via the NBN Gateway.
Website: www.ynu.org.uk
Summary
Society
Grant
Bat Conservation Trust
3000
British Arachnological Society
2719
Buglife – The Invertebrate Conservation Trust
707
British Entomological and Natural History Society
1879
British Phycological Society
1626
Carlisle Natural History Society
3000
Cheshire Active Naturalists
2450
Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Federation for Biological Recorders (CISFBR)
2,634.76
Cornwall Mammal Group
1500
Dipterists Forum
3000
Dorset Mammal Group
2800
Earthworm Society of Britain
892
EcoSoc (Essex University students)
2713.9
Essex Bat Group
2779.87
Friends of Aston's Eyot
937
Hampshire Amphibian & Reptile Group (HARG)
700
Harvestmen Recording Scheme (British Arachnological Society )
841.5
Isle of Wight Ringing Group (IWRG)
1767
Lancashire & Cheshire Entomological Society (Nat. Sawfly Rec. Scheme)
3000
The Mammal Society
2381.25
Worcestershire Bat Group
1382
Yorkshire Naturalists' Union
1590
