Natural England works for people, places and nature, to enhance biodiversity, landscapes and wildlife in rural, urban, coastal and marine areas; promote access, recreation and public well-being; and contribute to the way natural resources are managed so that they can be enjoyed now and in the future.
Natural Resources Wales ensures that the environment and natural resources of Wales are sustainably maintained, sustainably enhanced and sustainably used, now and in the future.
The UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (UKCEH) is the UK’s Centre of Excellence for research in the terrestrial and freshwater environmental sciences.
In addition to the vital partnerships with national recording schemes detailed in the previous section ‘Developing BRC’, close collaboration with other organisations has been a major theme throughout the 50-year history of BRC. Hosted within the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, BRC has benefited from a strong partnership between the research community (through CEH, its parent body NERC and other academic organisations) and statutory conservation bodies (through the Joint Nature Conservation Committee and associated bodies).
Citizen science can broadly be defined as the involvement of volunteers in science. BRC and the volunteer schemes have worked together to gather and analyse wildlife observations for 50 years providing evidence to underpin science, policy and practical conservation. During 2007, volunteer observers for biodiversity surveillance in the UK were estimated to contribute time in-kind worth more than £20 million. Combined with experience from other CEH-led citizen science environmental monitoring, CEH is becoming established as a leader in citizen science.
Behind the scenes the iRecord development team continue to maintain the online systems needed for such a large and complex recording platform. A major update to the Drupal software that iRecord uses was implemented in late 2021, to ensure that the site remains secure and up to date, and we continue to monitor and improve the performance of the systems wherever we can.
The Pollinator Monitoring Scheme has established two large-scale surveys; Flower-Insect Times Counts (FIT Counts) and 1km square surveys.
Despite huge improvements in air quality in recent decades, research consistently indicates that nitrogenous pollutants from agriculture, industry and transport are continuing to cause declines in plant species richness across a variety of semi-natural habitats. Ongoing monitoring across all groups of species will continue to provide evidence for increases and declines associated with anthropogenic pollution; evidence from across taxa can strengthen conclusions regarding large scale changes, particularly where multiple environmental drivers are acting in concert.
Habitat presence and quality is a controlling factor in the distribution and abundance of species. Widespread post-war habitat destruction led to a decline in many species and was a driver for the BRC’s establishment. Now, changes to habitats are often more subtle, brought about by factors such as fluctuating grazing pressure, eutrophication or changing climate. The recording schemes are essential in documenting the effect of these changes and in understanding the habitat requirements of species.
Biological records represent an essential resource to document and understand the impacts of climate change on biodiversity. High quality data has enabled the UK to be at the forefront of climate change research. Internationally important publications have also been produced directly from the data provided by volunteer schemes and societies. Current projects using biological recording data include assessing the risks and opportunities faced by individual species during climatic changes and identifying refugia which may help promote the persistence of species.