The wildlife conservation charity will celebrate three milestone anniversaries in 2026.
Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust looks back on 70 years of work to protect and enhance wildlife and wild areas across the two counties.
It also marks the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Rutland Water Nature Reserve, which in 1976 contained Europe’s largest man-made reservoir.
The Trust is further celebrating the 30th anniversary of the reintroduction of the osprey to Rutland, which has been extinct in the area since 1847.
Special anniversary events are held throughout the year at its sites and reserves to commemorate these milestones.
These include field walks led by expert reservist officers, an osprey session, a family open day at Cossington Meadows in Leicestershire and a gala evening.
One of Britain’s largest sea dragons unearthed in Rutland waters [Anglian Water]
Established in 1956, the Trust has grown over seventy years and now has 37 sites, more than 19,000 members and 700 volunteers supporting conservation work.
Charnwood Lodge in Coalville was one of the first reserves to be protected in the 1960s and is now a national nature reserve renowned for its geology and wildlife.
Rutland Water Nature Reserve was established in 1976 – one of the first such agreements with Anglian Water – with a new seven-mile-long reservoir and around 350 acres of surrounding land.
Five years later the reserve was internationally recognized as part of a Site of Special Scientific Interest and subsequently declared a Specially Protected Area and a Ramsar site of international importance.
Rutland Water has grown over the decades to include a new visitor center and volunteer training centre, both opened by Sir David Attenborough.
In 2021, during routine lagoon drainage, the reserve unearthed a 33-foot-long (10 m) ichthyosaur fossil, one of the largest sea dragons ever found in the UK.
Osprey 7R4 is the 300th osprey to be ringed and leave the nest in Rutland Waters [Stuart Wilson/Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust]
The Trust runs a number of successful campaigns, including the Rutland Osprey Project, launched in 1996, which removes chicks extinct in the county from nests in Scotland and releases them into Rutland waters.
In 2001, the first osprey was born in the UK. More than 150 years later, 300 ospreys have successfully fledged to full fledged status.
The trust said volunteers recorded six million birds, including 131 species, in Rutland Waters over 15,000 hours as part of the Wetland Bird Survey.
Dormice have been reintroduced to Leicestershire and more than 11,000 trees have been planted in Holwell.
Several reserves have also been expanded, and a plan has begun to transform 130 acres (54 hectares) of naturally exhausted land in Market Harborough into a wildlife haven, as well as establishing a new reserve at Great Bowden, which is due to open later this year.
Land in Market Harborough earmarked for rewilding project [Ian Drummond]
Mat Carter, chief executive of the trust, said: “We can look back with pride on our conservation work over the past seven years.
“This victory for wildlife in Leicestershire and Rutland shows what is possible in the ongoing fight for nature’s recovery.
“Our reserve network continues to grow and our projects across the wider rural area become more diverse and deeper.
“Rebuilding Harborough is a landscape-scale endeavor and that is our ambition for the future.”
Ann Tomlinson, chair of the Board of Trustees, added: “We all know that much needs to be done to ensure that nature, which is constantly under threat, can recover and provide services for future generations.
“The Trust’s work can make this important restoration a reality.”
The charity added that it will continue to work towards its 2030 target of “seeing nature restored and rejuvenated” in Leicestershire and Rutland.
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