PondNet great crested newt eDNA: 2020 Results are in!

22nd October 2020

We are glad to announce that we now have the results in for the sixth year of the Defra/Natural England funded PondNet eDNA Great Crested Newt Monitoring Project!

With COVID-19 playing havoc with everyone’s lives this year we had a herculean task completing all our surveys in 2020. In just one month, using kits provided by FeraScience, 131 randomly selected 1 km grid squares spread across England were sampled. In total 380 ponds in these grid squares were visited, along with a further 14 ponds on three of our Flagship Ponds site. These data will help us to monitor status and change in great crested newt.

Many thanks to Defra and Natural England for funding this project and to all the landowners and volunteers who have helped us with this.

Click on the links below to find out more: 

We have also put together a little video to showcase the many different pond types sampled in the 2020 monitoring survey, click on the link below to view: