Here are the latest updates from the National Education Nature Park team.

The National Education Nature Park Data Portal is now live!

All the Nature Park data can now be easily filtered and downloaded on the portal. It is open access so can be shared with anyone who might be interested. There is also a how-to-guide to go alongside it which can be found on the portal itself. The portal is a developing tool and there is a feedback form available for any comments.

The Grassland Plant Survey has early success with settings 

In just a few months since launch, the Grassland Plant Survey is proving to be popular right across the country. It can be carried out throughout the winter, and has wonderful pre- and post-survey curriculum-linked resources, so it’s a particularly adaptable survey to incorporate in lessons.  A video on how to run the Grassland Plant Survey has also been created.

Why record wildlife on your school site?

A new blog on wildlife recording and its importance has also been published to support the use of the Grassland Plant Survey and all the other Nature Park nature surveys.

The importance of recording was very well demonstrated when St Bartholomew’s School in Newbury recorded a moth on their school site that had never been recorded in Berkshire before! This shows that new discoveries can be made on school sites, and that school grounds can provide vital habitat for scarce species. Read more about this find as well as Why record wildlife on your school site

A new habitat guidance page on hedges

‘Add a wildlife-friendly hedge’ has been published on the Nature Park website. This guidance page covers how to plant and maintain a hedge and different considerations to think about when planning and choosing a hedge.