\n On the ground, Cutacre<\/a>, along with others sites across the country from Greater Manchester<\/a> to London are showing what can be done to boost access to valuable, wildlife-rich, green spaces close to people\u2019s homes and communities.\n<\/p>\n \n Thanks to the Lancashire Wildlife Trust, meadows have been boosted by plug plants of local wild species grown with Cheshire Wildlife Trust, including dyer\u2019s greenweed \u2013 a species that has been reintroduced to Greater Manchester after becoming functionally extinct in the area.\n<\/p>\n \n The site has threatened grey partridges, lapwings, skylarks, grasshopper warblers and willow tits and there are reedy, wetland areas which in the winter are \u201cstuffed full of snipe\u201d.\n<\/p>\n \n The reserve is also home to reed buntings, weasels and kestrels, and butterflies flitting through the meadows in summer.\n<\/p>\n \n Much of the landscape is being managed as lowland meadow for a \u201cbiodiversity net gain\u201d scheme, selling credits to support wildlife restoration to developers needing to meet requirements to increase nature overall as part of their developments.\n<\/p>\n \n However, the point of reserves such as Cutacre is being close to local people, says the trust\u2019s nature reserves senior officer Stephen Cartwright.\n<\/p>\n \n The site is edged by a housing estate, with more new houses going up nearby.\n<\/p>\n \n There is an industrial site with warehouses, and a scrapyard next door, but although it is very urban, \u201cyou can get a sense of being out of it when you\u2019re here\u201d, Mr Cartwright said.\n<\/p>\n \n \n And he said: \u201cIf you\u2019re a child growing up in a school over there, the majority of them won\u2019t travel to nature reserves, we need to bring reserves to them, we need the places right next to where people live, that are scrappy bits of land.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cIf you want nature there, it needs to be behind the industrial estate and the houses,\u201d he said.\n<\/p>\n \n \n Lancashire Wildlife Trust\u2019s Alan Wright added: \u201cWe want to engage people in nature and the best way to do it is do things next to where they live. This is a perfect example.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n The community is closely involved in the site, including schoolchildren, local residents who come out to check on the cattle every day and around 90 volunteers of all ages and walks of life.\n<\/p>\n \n A Defra spokesperson said: \u201cThis Government is focused on the things that matter most to the British public, including restoring nature so that we have pride in local communities and access to green spaces.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cWe are increasing access to nature and the countryside, delivering nine new National River Walks, including the Mersey Way and coastal path, both of which pass through urban areas.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cutacre Country Park in Over Hulton has transformed land on a former open cast coal mine, creating diverse…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":785097,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[1397,90,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-785096","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/785096","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=785096"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/785096\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/785097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=785096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=785096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=785096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} A view of Cutacre Nature Reserve in Greater Manchester. (Image: Emily Beament\/PA Wire)\n<\/p>\n
Undated handout photo issued by the Lancashire Wildlife Trust of a gatekeeper butterfly at Cutacre Nature Reserve in Greater Manchester. (Image: Alan Wright\/Lancashire Wildlife Trust\/PA Wire)\n<\/p>\n