Strengthening the New Forest’s Freshwater Network through habitat restoration

The New Forest is one of the few remaining high-quality freshwater landscapes in England. It supports a range of Priority freshwater habitats and species, many of which have disappeared from most other landscapes across the UK.

There is growing recognition of the exceptional biodiversity found within the New Forest, but this landscape still faces several threats such as nutrient pollution and habitat fragmentation. Despite these challenges, encouraging evidence from our work in the New Forest demonstrates that targeted action can deliver rapid benefits for biodiversity.

Protecting and expanding the freshwater network

The Species Survival Fund provided support for a phase of our Blue Horizons project, enabling targeted practical work to protect, restore and expand the New Forest freshwater network through habitat restoration and creation.

This was a collaborative partnership approach, bringing together conservation organisations, landowners, farmers, commoners, businesses and local communities. Together, we worked to improve both running and standing water habitats by reducing diffuse pollution and sedimentation, increasing water storage capacity across the landscape, and creating and restoring clean water habitats.

The Species Survival Fund grant facilitated practical conservation work across 172 hectares, creating seven pond complexes comprising of 22 individual ponds, and restored five ponds over four sites consisting of Priority habitat types of lowland fen, lowland heath and wet woodland.

These interventions are helping to expand and reconnect habitats across the New Forest, supporting priority species while increasing the resilience of the wider landscape.

We created a new clean water pond complex in the northwest of the New Forest. This photo shows one of the ponds a month after completion. This site was strategically placed for targeting conservation work due to its proximity to the New Forest SSSI and SAC. The site’s landowners are New Forest commoners, where cattle and ponies graze the site benefiting the ponds as they develop.

We carried out fen habitat restoration work in the southeast of the New Forest, which involved clearing gorse, willow scrub, alder scrub and reed. This photo shows one of the areas after willow and alder scrub were removed. Grazing cattle and ponies at the site will further support the habitat’s restoration.

Another clean water pond creation completed. At this site, Rhododendron control, botanical and invertebrate surveys, and management recommendations for mire areas were also an important part of our work here.

Driving species recovery through habitat restoration

Plant and invertebrate surveys before we got started helped to guide habitat restoration, meaning we could create new habitat in places that would benefit freshwater wildlife.

Botanical surveys identified 337 plant species, including 128 wetland plants, of which 31 are species of conservation concern. Notable species recorded include Hampshire Purslane, Lesser Spearwort, Marsh Pennywort, Coral Necklace, Pale Butterwort, Star Sedge, Oblong Leaved Sundew, Early Marsh Orchid, Royal Fern, and Marsh St John’s Wort. Surveys also discovered a rare fen habitat at a site in the Southeast region of the Forest and multiple newly identified Priority Ponds.

Aquatic invertebrate surveys across eight landholdings recorded 153 species, including 10 species of conservation concern. These included the Scarce Chaser, a predaceous diving beetle, several nationally scarce water scavenger beetles, and rare caddisflies.

Several ponds supported more than 50 freshwater invertebrate species each, demonstrating the exceptional ecological value of clean water ponds in the wider New Forest landscape.

- Coral Necklace in the New Forest

The project sites were all located around the edges, or ‘Halo’, of the New Forest’s protected areas. Surveys found high species diversity, notable species and priority habitats at these clean water sites. This strengthens understanding of the ‘New Forest effect’, a term to describe the incredible way in which species quickly colonise new habitats around the edge of the Forest.

Up until recently, funding for surveys like these has been limited, but thanks to the Species Survival Fund grant we have been able to carry out a programme of baseline survey work, providing valuable insights into the wildlife of the New Forest. We will be building on this knowledge and furthering our work with our partners through the Blue Horizons programme to continue to protect wildlife and restore and extend habitat through the Forest.

New Forest National Park Authority (NPA) and partners, including Freshwater Habitats Trust, have been awarded significant funding through the Species Survival Fund (SFF) Defra-funded programme, delivered by the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) in partnership with Natural England (NE) and the Environment Agency (EA), that aimed 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 partners included Amphibian and Reptile Conservation, Freshwater Habitats Trust, Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust (HIWWT), New Forest Commoners Defence Association (CDA), and Wild New Forest (WNF). The project ran from April 2024 to February 2026.