Managing parks and green spaces for nature

Our city's natural habitats and the species they support are important to us all.

Bristol declared an ecological emergency in 2020 in response to the alarming decline in many UK wildlife populations. A One City Ecological Emergency Strategy was produced with 4 goals:

manage 30% of land in Bristol for the benefit of wildlife
reduce the use of pesticides in Bristol by at least 50%
all waterways to have excellent water quality, which supports healthy wildlife
reduce consumption of products that undermine the health of wildlife and ecosystems around the world

Managing for Nature programme

Currently, around 15% of council land is managed for the benefit of nature. To support nature our Managing for Nature programme will be investing £1 million into our parks and green spaces over the next two years, having secured funding from the West of England Mayoral Combined Authority's Green Recovery Fund, matched to capital funding provided by the Council.

This investment will allow more of the city's green spaces to be managed for nature, boosting biodiversity and bringing communities closer to wildlife.

Our Managing for Nature programme will:

improve the ecological condition of existing natural green spaces through better management
create new habitats that improve connectivity for wildlife and implement ‘wildlife-friendly' practices across a wider area
engage more people with their local natural green spaces, increasing contact with and enjoyment of nature

How are we already managing existing spaces for nature?

We're responsible for over 1,000 hectares of land designated for nature conservation (around 3 times the size of Ashton Court or the equivalent of 1,500 football pitches). This land is split between 49 Sites of Nature Conservation Interest (SNCIs), which include 13 Local Nature Reserves designated as special places for people to experience nature.

Our SNCIs are the most important spaces for nature in the city. We have been managing many of these spaces to maintain and improve their value for wildlife and people.

Our main estates are significant areas of natural habitat that are rich in a variety of wildlife. In recent years we have undertaken significant habitat restoration schemes in many of these places:

Overall, we manage nearly 200 hectares of species-rich grassland in agreement with Natural England, where the grass is cut annually as hay and removed. This traditional form of management supports a wide variety of wildflowers and pollinator insects, including bees and butterflies. Since the 1930s, Britain has lost over 97% of these wildflower meadows.

Some grassland we manage through conservation grazing either with deer, goats or cattle at Stoke Park, Avon Gorge, Hengrove Mounds and Ashton Court. Conservation grazing is one of the most sustainable and ecologically beneficial ways of managing grassland habitats, which we are looking to expand.

Additional actions for nature have included:

supporting Friends of Parks groups to create new habitats including wildflower meadows, ponds, orchards and woodland
Hallen Marsh comprises over 50 hectares of wetland, grassland and woodland habitats, which have been created since 2020 as part of the Avonmouth Severnside Enterprise Area (ASEA) Ecology Mitigation and Flood Defence Project. The site will be managed primarily for wetland birds, but also supports other notable species including water voles
using less intensive grass management regimes across 80 hectares, such as our ‘longer summer grass' regime (grass cut once per year and arisings left)
keeping long grass margins alongside hedges and woodlands to give a transition between habitats that favours certain species
cutting some of our native hedgerows less frequently where they're not immediately next to footpaths. This will increase the amount of berries and nuts available to birds and other wildlife over the winter
reduced mowing of grass under trees to reduce compaction of soil and provide a wider range of habitats for insects
leaving fallen timber in situ as dead wood that supports a variety of insects and fungi
planted 6 hectares of woodland, 19 orchards and a mile of hedgerow in the past 3 years

How are we going to manage more spaces for nature in the future?

Over the next 2 years, our £1 million Green Recovery Fund project will:

improve 40 hectares of grassland, by introducing more nature-friendly grass management regimes (see below)
create 20 hectares of species-rich grassland through implementing new hay cut regimes and over-sowing with yellow rattle (to favour native wildflowers)
restore sections of the Malago and Pigeonhouse Stream in South Bristol in partnership with Bristol Avon Rivers Trust (BART) and local community groups
start work to restore habitats in 10 woodland SNCIs
create 5 new wildlife ponds
undertake a grazing feasibility study, to understand what the opportunities there are for expanding the area being grazed by animals under a conservation regime

New nature-friendly grass management

We are introducing new nature-friendly grass management regimes from Spring 2025 where we see the best opportunity to support nature's recovery. The new regimes are expected to increase the amount and diversity of wildlife, but this will take some time before nature can fully establish in these spaces.

These new regimes include floral lawns, wildflower meadow regimes, and tussocky grass. In most cases we will aim to remove the cut grass every time the grass is cut. This will, over time, reduce soil fertility and favour native wildflowers and pollinator species such as bees and butterflies. We will bring in new machinery to allow us to cut and collect the grass, which will then be sent to a green waste recycling facility.

We will learn from the success of this large-scale pilot and, subject to resources, look to expand these regimes more widely.

Maintaining access into parks and green spaces

Managing for Nature means sometimes stepping back and letting nature do its own thing. The grass will grow longer, and it might look a bit messier, but we're giving more species the space to thrive.

We are finding the balance between letting this process happen and making sure that people still have access to green space.

Through our Managing for Nature project, we will be working with communities and stakeholders to explain our approach to introducing more nature-friendly regimes and to gain support, listen to concerns and opportunities to do things better.

We're already listening to feedback given in the recent consultation on our new Parks and Green Spaces Strategy. This highlighted concerns around access to parks and how green spaces would be maintained.

We have applied a number of principles to the way we manage sites, which we hope will go some way to alleviate these concerns. These include:

mowing paths through areas where the surrounding grass is being left to grow longer
continuing to mow the edges of these grasslands so they do not encroach onto adjacent pathways, pavements or roads
from Spring 2025 we will be putting up signs to say that a space is being managed for nature and proving links to information and feedback
continue to provide mown areas that are maintained for recreation, sport, and amenity purposes, ensuring provision for all

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