Russell Wynn, Wild New Forest, 14 Jan 2025
The Species Survival Fund (SSF) is a Defra-funded programme, delivered by the National Lottery Heritage Fund in partnership with Natural England and the Environment Agency, that aims to restore and create habitats and halt species decline across England. In spring 2024, a new SSF project was initiated in the New Forest National Park, with a total value of £1.3M. The project is hosted by New Forest National Park Authority, with partners including Amphibian and Reptile Conservation (ARC), Freshwater Habitats Trust (FHT), Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust (HIWWT), New Forest Commoners Defence Association (CDA), and Wild New Forest. Further details are available here and here.
The SSF funding is for two years and will enable the project team to work with landowners across 25 sites to enhance 250 hectares of land for nature, with a focus on restoration and creation of wetlands, woodlands, heathlands, and wildflower meadows. Increasing the connectivity of high-quality habitats between the protected core of the New Forest and the surrounding countryside is also a key objective.
An integral aspect of the project is the delivery of baseline ecological surveys to enable the efficacy of management interventions at project sites to be assessed (i.e. are they delivering increased biodiversity). It is also important to ensure that any existing priority species on site are carefully considered when designing and delivering management interventions (i.e. ensuring that their populations can persist and expand).
During 2024, Wild New Forest completed baseline ecological surveys at ten SSF sites, mostly around the northern and southern fringes of the forest. These comprised visual walkover surveys supplemented by trail camera deployments, and a total of 130 field hours were completed between May and November.

Trail camera deployed at a SSF woodland site in autumn 2024.
Given time and funding constraints, it was recognised that these surveys would only capture a proportion of the total biodiversity at any site. Therefore, although all observed species were recorded, particular attention was paid to the recording of priority species, i.e. those that are classified as nationally rare or scarce based on the most recent assessment, and that are often tied to specific habitats.
In total, about 860 species were recorded across the ten survey sites, including 370 animals, 265 plants, and 225 fungi and slime moulds. This might sound like a lot of species, but it only represents about 5% of the total number of animal, plant, and fungi species estimated to occur in the New Forest.
Encouragingly, there were 150 records of 36 priority species. Many of these were relatively familiar and widespread New Forest species, such as Crossbill, Firecrest, Goshawk, Raft Spider, Wood Cricket, Woodland Grasshopper, Lesser Spearwort, Marsh Pennywort, Tormentil, and the fungi Hydropus floccipes and Laxitextum bicolor.

Male Crossbill feeding on larch cones on 19 June 2024.

Female Raft Spider defending her egg sac on 10 June 2024.

Hydropus floccipes on a moss-covered Oak on 18 Oct 2024.
However, there were also some nice surprises, and below I’ve provided a few examples of priority species recorded at four of the survey sites:
Site 1: The presence of high-quality fen and adjacent heathland habitats at this site produced many records of New Forest specialities, with plants including Common Cotton Grass, Lousewort, Round-leaved Sundew, and three species of heather, as well as nationally rare breeding birds such as Cetti’s Warbler, Dartford Warbler, and Woodlark. However, large expanses of open fen habitat have been lost from the site in recent decades, primarily due to succession to dense wet woodland dominated by willow and birch, although more open areas persist along the margins and where recent clearing has been undertaken. These sunlit areas held a great diversity of specialist plants and invertebrates, with priority species including Angular Orbweaver Spider, Bowed Jumping Spider, Large Black Longhorn Beetle, and Large Velvet Ant. Management interventions will focus on further clearance of encroaching scrub and trees to increase the area of damp open habitat and improve conditions for sun-loving plants and invertebrates.

Male Bowed Jumping Spider (Evarcha arcuata) on 11 July 2024; this nationally scarce spider requires mature damp heath and bog habitats with lush vegetation and plenty of sunlight.

Large Black Longhorn Beetle (Stictoleptura scutellata) on 11 July 2024; this nationally scarce ancient woodland specialist visits sunlit flowers such as bramble and hawthorn to feed.

Large Velvet Ant (Mutilla europaea) on 11 July 2024; despite the name this is a actually a nationally scarce wasp, and the wingless female shown here can deliver a painful sting if provoked!
Site 2: A well-established man-made pond at this site was found to contain an abundance of nationally rare Hampshire Purslane around its margins. Lake Pondskaters skittered across the water surface, and at least three Willow Emerald Damselflies (a recent colonist in Hampshire) were seen in suitable breeding habitat, while the abundance of commoner dragonflies and damselflies attracted a Hobby hunting overhead. A trail camera targeting the pond edge recorded Kingfisher on several dates as well as a female Goshawk coming down to drink and pluck her Woodpigeon prey. Management interventions here (and at a nearby seepage mire) will focus on removal of encroaching rhododendron and selected patches of willow to allow more light in, which will benefit some of the rare plants and insects already present.

Hampshire Purslane (Ludwigia palustris) with ovipositing Azure Damselflies on 17 June 2024; the New Forest is the only area of the UK where this rare aquatic plant is regularly recorded.

Willow Emerald Damselfly (Chalcolestes viridis) on 18 Sept 2024; this species colonised southeast England in 2009 and has spread rapidly, arriving in the New Forest in 2021.

Trail camera image taken on 26 Sept 2024 showing an adult female Goshawk (Accipiter gentilis) plucking her Woodpigeon prey.
Site 3: The survey of this parkland site was focussed on three existing wetland areas (two increasingly overgrown ponds and an area of damp meadow) and the surrounding semi-improved grassland that is being targeted for a potential new wetland. One of the existing ponds held breeding Common Toad and Raft Spider, and both Grass Snake and calling Lesser Spotted Woodpecker were found around the pond margins. The damp meadow contained dense carpets of Water Mint that acted as a magnet for pollinating insects, while priority flora included Marsh Valerian, Ragged-robin, and Skullcap - the latter supported a population of the infrequently recorded Skullcap Sawfly, with other notable wetland insects including Lesser Cream Wave moth and the nationally scarce mirid bug Adelphocoris ticinensis. The adjacent grassland held a family party of Woodlarks in June that had almost certainly bred on site and remained well into the autumn. Management interventions here will include work to maintain and enhance existing wetland areas, and hopefully the development of a new pond (or pond complex) in one of the areas of grassland.

This small seasonal pond, photographed here on 12 Nov 2024, was found to hold breeding Common Toad (Bufo bufo) and Raft Spider (Dolomedes fimbriatus).

Lesser Cream Wave (Scopula immutata); this attractive moth is locally distributed in damp habitats, with known larval foodplants including Meadowsweet and Common Valerian.

This rather damp adult Woodlark (Lullula arborea) was flushed from rain-soaked grassland on 14 June 2024, and was one of a pair that were subsequently watched feeding three newly-fledged juveniles.
Site 4: Surveys at this site revealed the presence of a small area of seepage mire persisting within an area dominated by non-native conifers and rhododendron understorey. Encouragingly, the mire still holds small populations of priority species such as Bog Myrtle and Small Red Damselfly, amid a dense carpet of Sphagnum mosses. The mire feeds into a man-made lake, and trail cameras in the surrounding woodland revealed regular visits by Pine Marten, including one seen carrying a frog in its mouth! These woodlands also held the nationally rare Ashen Woodwax fungus as well as the infrequently recorded Crimped Gill, Drumstick Truffleclub, and Ivy Parachute. Management interventions will likely focus on removal of rhododendron scrub to increase the area of open seepage mire and allow connection to the lake, combined with creation of a new wetland in an adjacent damp meadow.

Male Small Red Damselfly (Ceriagrion tenellum) on 21 June 2024; this species is nationally scarce, but relatively common in heathland bog habitats in the New Forest.

An unusual daytime image of Pine Marten (Martes martes), captured on trail camera on 21 Aug 2024; this species is now well established in suitable ancient woodland habitats across the New Forest.

Ashen Woodwax (Hygrophorus mesotephrus) emerging from mosses at the base of a beech tree on 29 Oct 2024; this is a nationally rare fungus associated with ancient beech and oak woodland.
In summary, it was encouraging to find that several of the survey sites already contain high-quality wetland, woodland, heathland, and grassland habitats that host a wide variety of priority species. However, it was also clear that in most cases the habitat has been negatively impacted due to encroachment of non-native species (e.g. rhododendron) or through changing management regimes (e.g. reduction in large herbivore grazing). At a couple of sites, analysis of old survey data and aerial images indicate that without rapid management intervention the key habitats (and the priority species that depend on them) will likely be lost within a few years.
In 2025, we will be revisiting some of these survey sites to assess the impact of management interventions on priority species and overall biodiversity, as well as conducting baseline ecological surveys at several new project sites.
Although the project is scheduled to finish in early 2026, the New Forest Biodiversity Forum has provided 60 days of additional staff time as a match-funding contribution, which will allow Wild New Forest to conduct three years of post-project monitoring at selected sites (Freshwater Habitats Trust are also contributing match-funding to enable their staff to contribute to post-project monitoring). This additional monitoring is vital, as it is likely that we will require these extra three years to really capture the biodiversity benefit of the management interventions. The intention is to then to produce a series of case studies from this project, evidencing the additional biodiversity benefits that arise from habitat creation and restoration adjacent to the protected core of the New Forest and its exceptional biodiversity.
I’d like to finish by thanking all the project partners and landowners who are supporting this work, particularly those colleagues who are stoically working through the abundant administrative tasks required for delivery of capital works within a tight project timeframe.