The Landscape, Natural Heritage & Eco-spirituality, not only deal with our spiritual and mental relationships but also our relationships with & anxieties for climate and nature and interests in flora, fauna & heritage landscape. Our projects aim to increase understanding of & conservation of the natural environment, heritage landscapes, habitats, special trees & heritage horticulture involving traditional orchards & organic, wildlife gardening with heirloom seed. We invite communities to link people with landscapes, in, for example, the Dumble communities of Nottinghamshire, especially those who do not usually access the countryside or traditional cultural or spiritual events. Our outdoor learning activities increase pleasure & safeguard natural heritage & target species. We put into action Habitat Action Plans & Species Action Plans & enrich biodiversity, to improve our countryside’s natural and historical heritage for the community.
Insects: Our community members monitor biodiversity - how many different species live in an ecosystem. They make butterfly counts and record moths, lady birds, shieldbugs, dragonflies, bees and spiders, beetles and other insects on an ongoing basis. But in national insect week we share our findings with our supporters. "A single teaspoon of the Cruiser SB pesticide is enough to deliver a lethal dose to 1.25 billion bees." Ecosystems are failing. The "insect apocalypse" sees insect numbers in England declining rapidly with 65% fewer insects recorded in 2021 than in 2004. Farming methods, councils cutting verges, inappropriate development & gardens that are wildlife deserts, lead to loss of biodiversity. Other wildlife flora & fauna & food production for humans is threatened & Climate Emergency increased. Fewer bees & other pollinating insects obviously lead to shrinking crops. Already, fruit growers in UK are seeing less yield and lower-quality produce because of loss of insects. Scientists warn that further loss could have significant impacts. In 2024 all of our partners, supporters, friends & volunteers are reporting a silent summer, with an unimaginable drop in insect numbers. Emergency legislation is required. Photographs shown here are by volunteers and supporters. Below: spider by our supporter Christina.
Monitoring takes place across our communities.
Our records have been submitted to Nottinghamshire Geological and Biological Records Office for many years. Our in house, specially designed volunteer species monitoring form has been in use on specified sites since the 1970's and provide a valuable data set. We check back to historical records on some of our sites, using: "A Flora of Nottinghamshire". Our volunteers are interested in linking in with East Midlands iSpot based at Nottingham University. Monitoring biodiversity has many benefits. Monitoring population sizes of protected species in conservation areas gives outlines the success of
conservation practice. Monitoring invasive species and infectious organisms, such as Varroa mite, can trigger corrective action. This is vital as biodiversity is being lost at national and international level. A number of species have become extinct in the UK in recent years.
The two photographs below are by our friend Gaina:
Warren Priest is looking for help in identifying 400 species of beautiful moths. Warren photographed the moths in Sikkim Province India. A link to Warren's photographs can be found in our links section. If you can help, please contact us in the first instance.
Making dead-wood piles for insect habitats, is always a popular activity with our volunteers.
Our community members made daily photographic records of this tree bumblebee colony in the run-up to National Insect week 2013, posting it on twitter at the start of the week. It was a great way to engage interest.
In her book "The Earth Path" by Starhawk, she reflects: "The number of insect species will tell you something about the amount of life energy on this spot".
We planted native pollen & nectar plants. The nations starving bees can not fend of virus attack and are weak in the face of agri-chemical poisoning. Our publicity campaigns during National Insect Week ask supporters to plant for bees & butterflies and be organic gardeners.
Remember to plant for night pollinators. Whilst plants such as annual poached egg plant, Limnanthes douglasii (which can grow in poorly drained clay soils) is great by day, Matthiola longipetala, known as night-scented stock or evening stock, is a species of ornamental plant that is brilliant and attractive in the evening.
Ivy is one of our most valuable wildlife plants and our only evergreen native climbing shrub. Given this, it is one of the species that we have chosen to target in our educational work. The only ivy native to the UK is Hedera helix. Only Hedera Helix has the full wildlife value as it bears flowers and berries which many of the cultivars do not. It has distinct juvenile and adult growth forms. It tolerates low light levels and a range of soils, favouring woodland where it provides good ground cover. In winter it benefits insects and small mammals by providing a foraging area for ground feeding birds such as thrushes and dunnocks. The dense vertical cover provides an ideal shelter and roost site for birds and bats such as the pipistrelle. Many species of bird such as wren, dunnock, blackbird and spotted flycatcher nest in ivy covered walls or trees. Several moth species depend on ivy as a larval food-plant and caterpillars of species such as the swallow-tailed moth, the old lady and the willow beauty can often be found feeding on the leaves. The holly blue butterfly is dependent on ivy as a food plant for its second generation caterpillars. Many species of butterfly (including Red admiral), moth, hoverfly, green bottle, wasp and bee are attracted to fuel up for hibernation at the flowers. It provides a very rich late summer to autumn nectar food, when other nectar sources are scarce; indeed queen wasps depend on these December flowers. The berries are an important food source for birds, including blackbirds, woodpigeons, collared doves, robins and blackcaps as well as small mammals such as wood mice. Comma, Painted Lady, small tortoiseshell and brimstone butterflies hibernate in ivy.
Ivy is not parasitic and draws sustenance through its earth roots, using the fibber fingers only to cling to non living, non vascular vertical bark surfaces. Indeed ivy becomes self supporting and can often retain its upright bush form after the death and decay of a tree, hence extending the valuable habitat. Ivy wood is strong yet flexible and has a forking characteristic; it has traditionally been used to make pitch forks. The plant has a range of folk uses. Ivy only climbs relatively mature trees and does not cause many problems. People often think that it is taking over a tree; however what is happening is that the tree may be old or have a fungal infection that is to blame for its reduced canopy and the ivy is taking advantage to fill the void and provide a new wildlife habitat. The spread of the plant in the crown of the tree can deprive the leaves in the tree canopy of sunlight. In the case of a dead or dying tree, it is possible that the wind could catch ivy and cause break out but more often ivy protects tree trunks by dissipating wind. In such cases strategic trimming of the ivy foliage can help (it is not all trimmed at once but the impact to wildlife is spread by rotating the areas trimmed over a number of years) but cutting the ivy stem is pointless, it will not reduce the foliage but will be unsightly and useless to wildlife. This work should be a last resort: avoid trimming during flowering and fruiting (berries stay on the bush between November and April), avoid bird nesting season (March-July) and get a professional bat survey as bat roosts are protected by law.
Willow, water & the moon: Willow pollards on the Dover Beck recorded by our community, 2010.
It is interesting to follow the landscape changes, as the becks & rivers run from the dumble valleys to the flat flood planes of the river Trent where, in places, riverine tree fauna has been lost to agricultural development.
Mapping the willows helps us to understand the importance of linear habitats. Rivers (& hedges, see our project,” understanding & using hedgerows” looking at everything from food & dye stuffs to surveying & encouraging sustainable management) can be link-corridors for species, reduce fragmentation & islandisation of habitats; so important in the face of climate change & development pressures. We all enjoy reserves but they can be wildlife ghettos if isolated. Vibrant character landscapes at landscape level are essential.
Dumbles differ from other river valley forms, the shape of the base is distinct, probably being formed by ice rather than water. They subsequently offer a route for becks, issuing from springs, along the hollow, valleys. The becks can cut small islands & changing paths in the steep-sided clay ravines with hanging ancient woodland. Here we find hazel, elder, ash, oak, blackthorn, hawthorn, alder, maple, crab apple, damson, bullace, dogwood, guelder rose & poplars, whilst all along the becks we find sallow, osier & hybrid willows whose roots prevent river bank erosion as the species colonizes. Willow seeds float off, needing to germinate within a few days in damp soil. Twigs break off & are carried down stream where they root easily.
Above: the great ancient willow pollards on the Dover Beck have been recorded by our volunteers since 2012. Below: new willow pollard made 2015.
Above: willow wood piles, following pollarding.
Crack willows (distinguished by a coarse toothed leaf edge, brittle twigs & grey bark) & white willows (high in natural “aspirin” salicin beneath the bark) often hybridise; an example being the cricket bat willow - so difficult to grow commercially due to watermarking.
Mature & ancient pollards can have huge knobbly girths.
Willows recorded by our community: above on the Cocker Beck 2013 and below on the Dover Beck 2014.
The silvery moon sheen leaves of white willow build up in the narrow crowned species & with the deeply fissured bark, help these trees to form mini nature reserves, with aphids, leaf beetles, gall wasps, weevils & sawflies on the leaves & long tailed tits calling from the tops of the pollards.
Crack willows split easily. Cracks contain soft, disintegrating wood chips, ideal for cozy, secret nest sites. While storm torn branches falling across dumble banks, make natural bridges from which we can watch the wake of water voles & twitching plants as they make for the bank-side burrows.
Smaller sallow willows, known by the popular pussy willows & rounder leaves, are also keen to hybridise. They are happy on high dumble banks & on drier open bank sides, eg: bushy common sallow/grey willow & wrinkle leaved round-eared willow, likes the acid sandy soil near to Gunthorpe. Sallows have had many uses. The early nectar was of use to beekeepers. Willow has often been cut for fodder in droughts; this is how goat willow was named. Sallows are one of the oldest tree species in the UK, so have had much time to hybridise…hence the many local forms. Below: Trent side willow stands.
The hybrids were often preferred for specific uses: from prehistoric times they have been used for wattles & basketry. They were used for tax receipt tallies (a split withy joined exactly, each party retained one half as proof. Parliament burned down when the “willow archives” were cleared to make way for modern systems, too many tallies were thrown onto the furnace at once), artists' charcoal, harness traces & plant propagation: willows give off root promoting hormones in water, slips were put into containers with plant cuttings.
Since 2004, our community has been recording willow pollards in the Dover Beck & Cocker Beck valleys & across the dumbles of Nottinghamshire, propagating plants from traditional East Midland basket willow varieties, such as the Basford Yellow Willow.
In the dumble wet ditches, rivers and streams, our volunteers record water shrews, water voles, narrow-leaved water plantain, kingfisher, winter cress, water crowfoot and burnet; in more open stretches near the Trent we can see grey heron & oyster catchers, egret and even glossy ibis and divers ...what do you see?
In the spring, native willow pollen is a very important sources of protein for eight species of bumblebee as well as butterflies, moths and other insects. Please don't cut back native willows. Leave plenty of willows for wildlife, such as queen bumblebees coming out of hibernation. Allowing native willows to grow will provide sustainable, long-term nectar for pollinating insects. Pussy Willow is the primary spring pollen and nectar source when little else is available. Willows grow fast (even on poor land) are easily and cheaply raised from cuttings and supply nectar and carbon capture in a few years. Native willows offer early pollen protein that can help rebuild our wild insect populations and improve pollination in wild plants and food crops; 20% of UK cropland bears insect pollinated crops, including apples, plums, pears, linseed, buckwheat and oilseed rape. The Chaplaincy has been raising this specific point, through 2024 and into 2025, with our Community Learning Groups & Communities of Interest Learning Groups as part of our project: Citizens Collective Action For Rewilding.
The River Trent at Hoveringham.
Pictured here, Hardraw Waterfall, Wensleydale contrasts with the gentle waters of the Dover & Cocker Beck valley; which give rise to many springs such as the Calverton Burnor Pool (haunted by a white lady who may be a memory of Bona Dea) and Kean well (with its Iron Age & Mediaeval history) or those of Lambley Dumbles. The Dover & Cocker Beck Valley & the Nottinghamshire Dumbles have many old willows, as can be seen in Hoveringham & Woodborough. In Burton Joyce we have Willow Wong, a wong being an Anglo-Saxon strip of land. The name willow comes from the Saxon “welig”.
Below: the Cocker Beck at Lowdham & clouds of sky blue chicory on the Cocker & Dover Becks.
Many of the willows that our community is recording are pollards. The trees are pollarded to reduce the weight, preventing the tree from cracking should branches be caught up in fast flowing river water or to produce osier or withy wands for basketry.
Before the NHS, willows were used to treat headache, rheumatism & diarrhoea, often in potions made by old village women this was one of the reasons the willow gained it’s name “witch tree” but also because it was said that sitting under a tree induced visions & because “willie wains” (a type of magical wand) was made from them. Also, to knock on wood for luck originated in people knocking on willow trees for luck.
The river Trent, Staffordshire.
Many people have a fondness for the willow from the title of the book “Wind in the Willows”. Willows give name to Barnaby in the Willows, where they grow along the anciently named River Witham. Pictures below of the Witham taken by our volunteers in September 2014, when recording water voles; the "ratty" of "Wind in the Willows". The Witham mainly flows through Lincolnshire, one section sheltering one of the last viable UK colonies of White Clawed Crayfish. The tidal Witham was navigated in the Iron Age & marked an important Roman junction. The Witham Shield & Fiskerton Boat, housed in Lincoln & the British Museums appear in our heritage activities.
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Willow appears in Chinese legend & in the Bible as the “weeping” willow…by the rivers of Babylon. But willows have many more associations. A willow tree was central the Rumanian Gypsy festival of Green George; when willow was used to bless the water, food plants & animals. The Greek Orpheus carried a willow branch to indicate eloquence & is depicted at Delphi with next to a willow tree. Persephone had her willow grove, whilst Hecate, a goddess of moon & willow, watched over grave yards planted with willows. The willow has its own faerie, Heliconian, the ancient priestess Helice sought help from these tree spirits for her water magic. The “Day of the Willow” brings rain & was part of the feast of Tabernacle, an association derived from stories of Antha & the Greek Athena. The Sumerian Goddess Belili was associated with willows, springs & the moon, her one time consort Bel is now associated with Beltane.
St Swithin’s Day takes place on the 15th of July, is perhaps a good day to pay our respects and gratitude to the waters of the world. Water can sustain or destroy and should be treated with respect, kept pure and free from contamination and we should question if our societies should allow profit to be made from life sustaining water that is needed by and should be shared with all life.
Above, the popular Beck Hole.
Psalm 23.2 "You find me in quiet pools"
Whitsuntide and the White Goddesses: in the winter you could think this hawthorn bush dead. It stands in Winkburn, near Southwell, not far from the knights Hospitaller church of St John of Jerusalem, a church built on Saxon foundations and with an early Norman tower and Nave. At Whitsuntide, the seemingly dead wood it is all May blossom. In the Christian calendar Whitsuntide is Pentecost, so it is fitting that the tree stands near the Hospitaller's church. The week following Whit Sunday used to be a holiday for medieval farm workers, to mark the start of summer, when the white blossom is out. At this holiday girls used to dress in white & Whit fairs took place in some parts of the country, with country dancing, these were called Whitsun Ales. Whit Monday the day after Whitsun, remained a holiday in Britain until 1971. Both the festival and the hawthorn bush in May have become associated with the white goddesses. On May Day or Beltane, it was said that witches could transform themselves into hawthorn trees. Nimue, Merlins perhaps sister, goddess & queen of witches, trapped Merlin in the thorns of a hawthorn tree. Todays druids & wiccans sometimes hang cloutties or ribbons in hawthorn trees, to ask for wishes or healing, but many green witches ask that this is not done for fear of littering not only the physical but also the magical area around the tree.
Below, group of service users on a First Peace Chaplaincy facilitated educational visit to Sherwood Forest National Nature Reserve; in an area showing the woodland-heathland mosaic.
Native Wildflowers: The United Nations states that climate change refers to long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns, mainly caused by human activities, especially the burning of fossil fuels.
Through our climate change work, links with partners in East Africa, India & Pakistan.
In addition, we have been helping people to find good learning tools in the public domain. For example: we had a good response in our learning communities to a video & graphics by Julia Steinberger: "Struggle for survival", from the ISC 2021 Summer School – Cognitive Challenges of Climate Change. Students understood the need for sustainable food production, vegan diet, protecting water, land and biodiversity, using clean fuels, pollution control, limited air travel, and importance of climate activism.
98% of flower rich meadows have been destroyed with most livestock farms growing “improved grassland” often branded “green concrete” by naturalists for its poor biodiversity. One in six woodland flowers are threatened with extinction. In fact one in five UK wildflowers is under threat of extinction, Plant Life estimates that each county looses one species every two years. Verges offer three times more grassland than farmed pasture but they are often sadly, contaminated by salt and heavy metals and are over managed, with destructive and costly mowing regimes. Wildflowers contribute to scientific and medical research with some UK native wildflowers contain compounds that can be used in drugs to treat diseases. For example, foxgloves (Digitalis purpurea) contain chemicals used to treat heart conditions. If we were to lose wildflower species, we could lose potential new medicines.
In addition, we would encourage "no mow May" to be expanded to "no mow summer". In a ratio based on summer test averages, taken in 2023: uncut grass keapt the ground at 19.5°C but grass cut at 10cm keapt the ground temperature at only 24.5°C. In contrast, bare ground was hot, at 40°C.
At First Peace Chaplaincy we have a huge data base of wild flower & tree records for the East midlands. The extent of climate change, habitat loss, water loss, drying and pollution, herbicide, fungicide, pesticide, soil loss and soil structure destruction and miss management can be traced through our records. We check our records against the earliest available records in each of our operational areas, using Biological and Geological Record Centres data sets and sources such as the Flora of Nottinghamshire by Richard Crewdson Leaver Howitt and Brenda Margaret Howitt.
"The Golden Ass" by Apuleius, is the only ancient Roman novel in Latin to survive in its entirety. A wonderful description is given of a goddess rising from the sea: "crowned with an intricate chaplet, woven of every kind of flower" She states: "I am Nature the Universal Mother".
The Chaplaincy Eco-spirituality programme encourages natural regeneration and propagates a wide range of wild plants and flowers and open pollinated heritage vegetables, obtained from ethically sourced parent plants.
We offer resources on organic community gardening, composting and soils, open pollinated and heritage plants, food growing and seed saving, traditional orchards, garden bee and butterfly and wildlife habitats.
Have you thought about growing a mini meadow in your garden or in a container? Children will love to count and draw the visiting bees, butterflies and other insects. You will attract more if you create a bee nesting box or leave uncultivated wild areas for habitat.
The virtuous circle: in order for us to continue to enjoy wildlife, protection is needed for habitats and our magical natural places, the more people have responsible access to and learn about nature the more they will treasure these places and demand protection. Biodiversity Metric 4.0 was published by Natural England early in 2023, along with an updated version of the Small Sites Metric. It is a biodiversity accounting tool that can be used for the purposes of calculating biodiversity net gain. DEFRA's biodiversity metric consultation states that they anticipate Biodiversity Metric 4.0 and the Small Sites Metric will constitute the basis of the future statutory biodiversity metric when mandatory biodiversity net gain is commenced. The habitat based approach indicates value to wildlife by assessing habitats and the impact that development, or a change in land management, will have on the biodiversity value of a site. But such assessments consider the condition of each habitat parcel and whether the sites are in locations identified as local nature priorities, these considerations obviously protect some sites whilst disadvantaging others.
Monitoring wild plant species by our volunteers in the East Midlands is fun because the region has such diverse habitat types.
The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.
At First Peace Chaplaincy eco-spirituality project, we believe that society should take pressure off nature, promote natural regeneration, biodiversity, veganism, adoption and lower population, in order to protect habitats, water and soil. People are calling for to ban chemicals in land management, along with heavy plant, hedge flailing and agri/forests. Natural places are precious and finite, the earth can not sustain destructive development.
Cultural and spiritual experiences impact on conservation work, attitudes and views of nature. Spiritual perspectives influence concepts of nature, this varies depending on depth of belief and spiritual and religious diversity. Environmental experiences, especially within culturally protected landscapes, can lead to shared values or collective conflict. deeply held community values within traditional societies or more individual beliefs within, for example paganism, or secular situations give rise to a huge range of varying values. Both communal and individual values can benefit conservation. Thinking about ecosystems can throw up additional values to those of biodiversity concern or physical wellbeing, these may be material or non material, intellectual, spiritual or transcendental. Connections to nature and ecopsychology can benefit from acknowledging the diversity of life & nurturing wider respect for life and the spiritual practices of others.
Communities may value the natural and cultural and spiritual aspects of places. From Stone Henge to the Dakota Badlands, sacred spaces and the flora and forna within them have spiritual meaning for some visitors. people may seek healing or benefit from enhanced well-being through contact with a site or experience individual profound responses and tangible and intangible reactions. It could be argued that all natural sites are sacred, such a stance has the capacity to support nature conservation.
Environmental ethics, human wellbeing and moral significance should be considered in conservation. However, urgent environmental issues lead to these considerations being overlooked in emergency situations. We seek to build these now, into general response mechanisms, ahead of such urgent situations. Robust responses can reassure, give inner peace and give harmony to the soul.
Peter Owen Jones is an Anglican vicar, one of his many books: "conversations With Nature", has been described as "a cross species conversation." In it he describes his direct encounters with nature. He talks of healing and peace, saying: " each breath you take is receiving" and "We learn to hear the voices of the mountains, the rivers, the sky, of silence." We cam meditate on these words and try to put them into practice as we walk the earth.
Water and food security needs sustainable planning. Human animal and plant diseases spread globally. The seas are endangered, the planets ecosystems are polluted and carbon sinks depleted. That is why we emphasise our Vegan Kozy Kitchen & Organic Trials Garden projects. The desert fathers offered examples of simple prayerful life, today the Daniel diet is popular, where faith sustains fasting and diet. The planet has a growing human population and dwindling resources. Waste reduction brings welfare benefits, equitable food and water systems, sharing and redistribution should be part of spiritual life. Soil and seed diversity must be protected.
Below: a community member recorded a good mix of species in this ancient hedge in Paplewick
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