Yorkshire’s wildlife is disappearing fast, and with your support Yorkshire Wildlife Trust will reverse this decline. We will provide a brighter future for Yorkshire’s wildlife on land and at sea, ensuring nature thrives and continues to provide those services we rely on whilst inspiring the next generation to be the guardians of our county’s beautiful wildlife. Yorkshire’s wildlife is in decline. Threatened by development, some changes in farming practises, climate change and direct persecution, 60% of our wildlife is threatened with extinction. Yorkshire is a big place, but very little of it now provides a home for our beautiful wildlife.

Many of the changes affecting wildlife have also damaged the services nature provides, such as reducing flood risk, cleaning our air and water and pollinating our fruit and crops. Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, with your support will reverse this decline, protect the services nature provides and give a brighter future to Yorkshire’s wildlife. Threatened by development, improvements in farming, climate change and direct persecution, 60% of our wildlife is threatened with extinction. For instance, 97% of our lowland meadows have disappeared since the middle of last century.

Yorkshire is a big place, but very little of it now provides a home for our beautiful wildlife. And what fantastic wildlife we have! From the remaining flower-filled meadows of the Yorkshire Dales, to the teeming seabird cliffs of Flamborough Head, we have a county with many wildlife treasures. Sadly, these gems are now isolated or threatened and with the support of Yorkshire folk, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust is working hard to protect them. We need more havens for wildlife. We need nature reserves that are better looked after for both wildlife and people.

We need to work with landowners and partners to link up these havens, field by field, hedge by hedge. Rebuilding a living landscape is the only way to secure a future for our wildlife and to ensure our quality of life in God’s own county. A key part of this is inspiring people. We are a part of nature even though we may feel distant from it. Nature provides us with many services we take for granted; pollinating our fruit trees and crops, cleaning our water, stopping our homes and businesses from flooding. If the environment and its wildlife is damaged, these services begin to fail and in the face of climate change, we need these services more than ever. We need our wildlife and environment as much as it needs us. Helping people to understand this and inspiring them to take action or just to enjoy wildlife is an essential part of our work and has great benefits for health and happiness too.

Our vision for living landscapes is mirrored offshore too. Our vision for a living sea in Yorkshire involves lobbying government to implement the Marine Act, protecting a network of marine protected areas where our beleaguered marine wildlife can thrive, without the ever-present threat of exploitation and damage. With these twin visions, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust is working hard to ensure the future of Yorkshire’s wildlife is bright. With your help, our voice for wildlife is louder, our resources greater and our impact higher. Yorkshire’s wildlife is in decline, but with your support, we can reverse this and build a county rich in wildlife for everybody.