Watchtree Nature Reserve

A plan for a nature reserve emerges

During the course of the initial consultations, the site was transferred to the control of the DEFRA Building and Estate Management Division (BEMD) at Crewe. At this point a local environmental consultancy EMS suggested the option of establishing a nature reserve. This suggestion was accepted by DEFRA, and immediately put to the Liaison Group members.  The Liaison Group and the local community realized that the creation of a nature reserve was the best way forward and would be a long-term asset to the community.

The next six months saw the development of a site design and habitat management plan that aimed to create specific habitats and attract wildlife species of particular interest, as stated in the Cumbria Bio-diversity Action Plan (launched in November 2001).  The site design received overwhelming public endorsement at an open day exhibition held in November 2002.

While the site was being reconfigured to the new landscape design, local residents and the Watchtree Liaison Committee, (formed during the FMD crisis to represent local community interests to DEFRA) began to investigate forming a social enterprise company that would eventually take over and manage the Nature Reserve.  Having agreed to the idea of a nature reserve, in March 2003 DEFRA agreed to the management of the reserve being undertaken by a group of local people in the form of a social enterprise.  In August 2004, Watchtree Nature Reserve Ltd. was registered as a ‘not for profit company limited by guarantee’, in order to ‘provide a sustainable and community asset, [and] to demonstrate the encouragement and conservation of wildlife, through habitat creation’.

The social enterprise that has now emerged undertakes the management of all aspects of the nature reserve through a contracted relationship with DEFRA. It has a committee of seven people, plus a staff of one, as well as various sub-contractors and consultants. In addition it has a ‘Friends of Watchtree’ organisation of around thirty people. The aspirations of the organisation are to consolidate its current work, develop next-generation activities (particularly in respect of educational and promotional actions), and support the development of additional social enterprise opportunities.  It is anticipated that this project will continue for at least the next 25 years – with the possibility of taking ownership of the whole operation at the point when the decomposition of the carcases is complete and the site will be handed back.

The seven members of the WNR Board  comprise:

  • A now retired professional initially seconded to work on the site through English Nature
  • An employee of the Environmental Agency involved professionally in aspects of FMD and Vice-Chair of Watchtree Liaison Committee
  • One of the two partners from the commercial company that originally proposed the idea of a nature reserve to DEFRA and who developed the site and habitat plans
  • A farmer with land adjoining the site
  • An ecologist working on the site
  • An employee of the health authority with an involvement in the social issues resulting from FMD, a local parish councillor and Chair of the Watchtree Liaison Committee
  • A former farmer and chair of one of the four local parish councils and a member of the Watchtree Liaison Committee.

The importance of these individuals driving forward the social enterprise cannot be overemphasized, and neither can  their association to the site prior to working together. In all cases association pre-dates the formation of the social enterprise that is now Watchtree Nature Reserve Ltd. Perhaps most surprising is that this collective of skills and experience is all local, and drawn from within a 10 kilometre radius of the site itself, and from a resident population numbering less than ten thousand people.

Watchtree has been an enormous environmental undertaking.  The establishment of the Nature Reserve has provided the opportunity to help farmers and their families come to terms with upheaval and change in farm and environmental management that have followed the FMD nightmare. One of their expressed hopes is that their own children and grand children will continue to see the benefits of their labour.