19 June 2024

EXEC’S CORNER

A very warm welcome to the latest issue of our two-monthly newsletter. Summer appears finally to be with us, though the image above taken at Rothamsted Research on 11 May shows the excellent weather we enjoyed last month for the visit to the Park Grass long-term experiment that we hosted jointly with the Royal Society of Biology (RSB). This was mainly for guests from the RSB’s London branch and you can read about the visit in this issue, including a link to a blog written by one of our visitors.

Science communication is a major component of ECT’s charitable objectives enshrined within our Articles of Association. The Park Grass visit was but one contribution to that objective that appears in this issue of our newsletter. Further below you can read about our work on a brand new interpretation board installed this month at one of the long-term experiments on ECT’s national register. We were pleased to attend the installation at Natural England’s Aston Rowant National Nature Reserve in Oxfordshire of a board describing the long-term ecological succession experiment (following land management interventions) that has been running at the Lena Ward Plots on the reserve since 1969.

And finally, we look forward to meeting with those of you who are attending the major Resilient Landscapes symposium in Birmingham next week on 24/25 June. Please do stop by the ECT’s exhibition stand for a chat and to try out a VR headset tour of the Plynlimon Catchments landscape-scale long-term experiment.

Ben Sykes

LATEST ECT SMALL GRANT AWARDED

ECT has awarded a maintenance grant to Nina Overtoom and Sylvia Toet at the University of York as a contribution to the costs of repairing and replacing essential research equipment at the 14-year-long Cors Fochno climate change experiment near Borth in mid-Wales. This award has been co-funded with our partner charity Ramble Worldwide Outdoor Trust.

SECOND ECT/BES LANDSCAPE STAKEHOLDERS’ WORKSHOP REPORT

Following the second landscape-scale transformation workshop hosted by ECT, the British Ecological Society and other NGO partners on 25 January in London, a full formal report of the proceedings is now available. Read it here.

PARK GRASS EXPERIMENT VISIT

Our collaborative visit to the 168-year-long Park Grass experiment with the Royal Society of Biology London branch on 11 May was a success. Over 20 people attended on a fine sunny day which began with talks by Keith Goulding, Jonathan Storkey and Andy Gregory from Rothamsted Research. Our thanks go to Keith, Jonathan and Andy for their guided tour of the experiment for members of the RSB’s London branch. Patrizia Ferretti (UCL) from the RSB London branch has written a blog about the visit. Read it here.

UPCOMING EVENT

In partnership with the British Ecological Society, Natural England, National Trust, RSPB, Woodland Trust, WWF and UKCEH, ECT is co-hosting and attending the scientific symposium Resilient Landscapes for People, Nature and Climate in Birmingham on 24-25 June 2024. If you are attending, do call by our exhibition stand and try out one of our VR headset tours of three of the LTEs on our national register. Learn more about the symposium.

MAY WEBINAR RECORDING NOW AVAILABLE

The recording of our most recent two-monthly webinar with Julie Ewald (Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust) on the Sussex Study: Impacts of Farming Changes Over 56 Years is now available to watch on YouTube.

LONDON MARATHON 2025: FUNDRAISING FOR ECT

The secured ballot places for the London Marathon 2025 are being announced later this month. If you are running in the London Marathon next year, would you consider running in support of the ECT? We can offer promotion, and help raise your profile. Please do get in touch if you would like to help raise funds for ECT in this way.

NEW PUBLICATION FROM TreeDivNet

TreeDivNet is a global network of forest diversity experiments and a unique research platform on the relationship between tree species diversity and ecosystem functioning. A new publication ‘Tree diversity enhances predation by birds but not by arthropods across climate gradients’ has been published in Ecology Letters which includes data from 14 forest long-term experiments.

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