{"id":223726,"date":"2025-06-29T10:14:15","date_gmt":"2025-06-29T10:14:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/223726\/"},"modified":"2025-06-29T10:14:15","modified_gmt":"2025-06-29T10:14:15","slug":"beautiful-surrey-landscape-becomes-nature-reserve","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/223726\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Beautiful’ Surrey landscape becomes nature reserve"},"content":{"rendered":"

Zac Sherratt<\/p>\n

BBC News, South East<\/p>\n

\"SurreySurrey County Council<\/p>\n

A view of Crooksbury Hill, which forms part of the new Wealden Heaths National Nature Reserve<\/p>\n

A Surrey landscape which is home to lizards and an area known as the Devil’s Punchbowl has been designated a national nature reserve.<\/p>\n

Natural England, which advises the government on the environment, announced the creation of the Wealden Heaths National Nature Reserve on Friday.<\/p>\n

It means the 2,766-hectare landscape has been marked out as an area of focus for conservation and nature restoration efforts.<\/p>\n

The new reserve is the ninth to be created as part of the King’s Series, which aims to make or extend 25 national nature reserves by 2027.<\/p>\n

The landscape boasts a rich mix of habitats, including acidic grassland, regenerating woodland and heath \u2013 making it a haven for rare species such as sand lizards, nightjars, adders and natterjack toads.<\/p>\n

It is also home to the Devil’s Punchbowl \u2013 a natural amphitheatre in the heathlands near Hindhead, which is said to have been formed when the Devil scooped up earth to throw at Thor.<\/p>\n

‘Atmospheric landscape’<\/p>\n

It inspired literary figures such as Arthur Conan Doyle and Alfred Lord Tennyson, who wrote Flower In The Crannied Wall in Waggoners Well.<\/p>\n

The new reserve combines the existing Thursley National Nature Reserve with 2,440 hectares of partner-managed land \u2013 of which 1,784 hectares are designated as a site of special scientific interest.<\/p>\n

Nature minister Mary Creagh said: “This new reserve offers wonderful opportunities for people to experience the outdoors and spot rare wildlife in a place which has been a source of cultural inspiration for centuries.”<\/p>\n

Marian Spain, chief executive of Natural England, said: “The beautiful atmospheric landscape has had a huge influence in culture over the centuries, from folklore to poetry.<\/p>\n

“Its new status as a national nature reserve will ensure future generations continue to be inspired.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Zac Sherratt BBC News, South East Surrey County Council A view of Crooksbury Hill, which forms part of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":223727,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3843],"tags":[728,70,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-223726","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-environment","9":"tag-science","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114766130148957731","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/223727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}