Saving England's most threatened species from extinction
Archive:
11th May 2020
Birthday competition! On May 19th 2019 the first English born Chequered Skipper was spotted in Rockingham Forest – the first in over 40 years, following the reintroduction of this previously extinct species in 2018 from Belgian populations. To celebrate this fantastic moment, we are launching our #ChequeredSkipperBirthday baking and card-making competition for all ages. How...
Read more15th January 2020
Read this wonderful blog by Julia Thorley who hosted two events recently with our Roots of Rockingham project team. BOTANICAL BARDS This was the title of the workshop I ran yesterday with my friends at Back from the Brink. You might recall I did one in the autumn based on the birds of Fineshade...
Read more9th December 2019
The Roots of Rockingham have blossomed with many fantastic successes this year! The first Chequered Skipper butterfly to emerge in England in over 40 years was recorded in the Rockingham Forest this year as a result of a successful translocation following dramatic and extensive habitat improvement work by Forestry England. This year a second reintroduction...
Read more12th November 2019
Woodland Birds Creative Writing Even if you've never been to Northamptonshire, there is a good chance you've heard of Rockingham Forest. This was once a hunting forest covering over a third of the county; it now exists in isolated patches dotted through a farmed landscape, giving people like me the opportunity to walk in nature...
Read more9th October 2019
Chequered Skipper caterpillar find! Over the last couple of years, I have been involved with the volunteer monitoring of the Chequered Skipper release in Rockingham Forest, firstly with the adult butterflies brought in from Belgium , and then with the butterflies that had emerged from those first adults. Later in the first year we had...
Read more17th September 2019
Following the successful reintroduction of the Chequered Skipper to the Rockingham Forest, the Back from the Brink Roots of Rockingham team are on a mission to spread the word! As community engagement officer, one of my tasks is to take the news about our project into schools and get young people interested in what’s going...
Read moreOne of my favourite things to do is walk in the woods. Another is to write, and a third is to make zines. This project let me do all three, with some brilliant young people and families! We created a zine called Fans of the Forest, celebrating Fineshade Woods and the plants and animals...
Read more29th August 2019
Spotty Chequered Skippers! Following the announcement of our news about the initial Chequered Skipper success (very exciting!), people have been curious as to why red spots can be seen on the wings of some of the butterflies. Hopefully this blog post will reveal all. This year we bought a second batch of Chequered Skipper’s over...
Read more25th July 2019
The Chequered Skipper Flies Again! Seeing Chequered Skippers flying once again in their former English strongholds has been a dream of mine since I was a child. I grew up in Northamptonshire in a house that backed on to fields and while exploring the seemingly endless natural world beyond the back gate I developed a...
Read more28th June 2019
A previously extinct butterfly has bred successfully in an English woodland for the first time in more than 40 years as part of the ambitious conservation project, Back from the Brink. Freshly emerged Chequered Skippers have been regularly spotted over the last few weeks at a secret location in Rockingham Forest, Northamptonshire, and it is...
Read more