A RARE meadow near Malvern is a step closer to being saved after receiving an almost £200,000 grant for the Heritage Lottery Fund.
The Worcestershire Wildlife Trust, the county’s largest conservation charity, launched a fund-raising appeal in the summer of last year to save 50 acres of rare floodplain at Hardwick Green Meadows in Eldersfield.
And the trust is celebrating the award of a £197,000 grant towards the purchase of meadows and work to involve the community.
Together with donations from individuals following a public appeal, gifts left in Wills to the Trust, a donation of £50,000 from Severn Waste Services through the Severn Waste Environmental Fund and generous support from a number of charitable trusts, the trust is nearing its target to purchase the fields.
The fields are currently owned by the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation who agreed to buy them on a short-term basis to give the Trust time to raise the necessary funds to buy them.
Mike Perry, head of resources for the trust, said: “This is fantastic news. We’ve been overwhelmed by the response from our public appeal and would like to say a big thank-you to everyone who has helped and supported us to buy these beautiful meadows so far.
“From spring and throughout summer the meadows are teeming with wildflowers, butterflies, bees and birds.
Hares have been spotted there and we’ve even got camera trap footage of otters using the brooks that run through the site.
“Hardwick Green Meadows are also a rare remnant of a once much more common habitat.
“In fact, there are only 3,500 acres of these meadows left in the whole of the UK – that’s about the size of Heathrow Airport.”
Funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund will allow the trust to work with the community, especially schoolchildren.
The delicate nature of the meadows mean that they will be open for special open days and seasonal trails.
The meadows are also rich in plants such as great burnet, pepper saxifrage and corky-fruited water dropwort.
Once the purchase is completed the trust will begin to make structural improvements like repairing bridges over the brooks to ease management of the individual fields.
For further information about the appeal or to help save the meadows visit www.worcswildlifetrust.co.uk/appeal.
