Biodiversity is widely recognised to be in a critical state, with populations declining globally, and species going locally and globally extinct. 

Within Durham, there is a large cohort of people, including within the Conservation Ecology Group in Biosciences, working to understand and stem these declines. Research undertaken within Biosciences includes exploring the reasons for migratory species declines, led by Prof Stephen Willis and Dr Christine Howard.  

Prof Willis, originally from County Durham, returned to join Durham University almost 30 years ago as a postgraduate, and completed an MSc and PhD at Durham, before working his way up to a Professorial post. He is now the Director of Research and Deputy Head of the Department of Biosciences. His initial work explored the impact of Cow Green Reservoir on rare upland vegetation communities in Teesdale, following in the footsteps of Prof Margaret Bradshaw (recent Honorary Doctorate and former member of the School of Education). Professor Bradshaw, now 97 years old, continues to monitor the rare plants of Upper Teesdale, following up work she instigated in the 1960s.  

Prof Willis’s subsequent work has focused on the impact of climate change on species, and on the conservation of species, with the latter projects having been represented on every continent. He is currently also working closer to home, on projects with Durham Wildlife Trust and others, and on growing local wildflowers for use in conservation projects. 

Dr Howard came to Durham as a PhD student and has recently been promoted to an Assistant Professor post. She worked on the impacts of climate change on bird species for her PhD and subsequently worked, under the supervision of Prof Phil Stephens, on the factors causing species to be threatened.  

Prof Stephens and Willis have worked collaboratively on numerous projects exploring environmental threats to species, using approaches as diverse as weighing large African mammals on cattle scales in savanna habitats (to monitor their changing body condition), to using camera traps and citizen science to monitor the UK’s hedgehog population, and using acoustic recordings to locate precisely bitterns (a rare heron species that advertises its presence with a low booming call) in impenetrable reed-swamps.  

Another staff member in Biosciences, Dr Rebecca Senior, who joined Durham in 2021, also works on related global conservation issues, on topics as varied as: exploring the impacts of the global wildlife trade on species, identifying gaps in the global protected area network, and exploring the role rewilding can play in the British countryside.  

Dr Kieran Lawrence, a DU undergraduate alumnus and lifelong north-east resident, also completed a PhD in Durham, exploring changes to the timing of bird migrations and predicting future migratory journeys. He is now working as a teaching fellow in Biosciences, educating the next generation of conservation biologists on field courses in the UK and Africa, as well as working part-time on the university’s biodiversity strategy. 

Dr Tom Smart, another recent graduate, studied how global zoos need to be more climate-smart, and developed algorithms that could assist zoos in choosing key species to maximise their future conservation benefit. Tom is now working for Natural England, the UK’s Government Conservation Advisor, on regional nature recovery strategies.  

Even closer to home, members of the Conservation Ecology Group in Biosciences at Durham, working with the University Estates and Facilities Team, and aided by numerous undergraduate and postgraduate summer studentships, have produced the University’s first ever Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan, which has identified many hundreds of species that occur across the university estate and provides a framework to ensure biodiversity net gain for the university grounds in the next decade. 

Peter Thomson, Botanic Garden Manager, and Jonny Briggs, Head of the University Grounds team, have facilitated actions on the ground to deliver the Biodiversity Strategy. For example, the Botanic Garden has grown on cuttings of Black Popular trees, of which only a handful are left in the wild in the County, and the Grounds Team have delivered no-mow-May across 8 hectares of grassland this summer. At the same time, Leonard Davis, a modern apprentice in Biosciences, is supporting conservation impact by helping to deploy camera and audio recorder to monitor biodiversity, and by growing on native wildflowers, the latter as part of a developing local wildflower spinout company. 

We’re already starting to see the early results of this local biodiversity work, with orchids, hedgehogs and birds of prey being seen with increasing regularity across the university estate. We have also introduced long-lost plant species to university wetlands. As a result, in 2023, the university won the national Green Gown Award for our Nature Positive work and, in 2024, has been shortlisted for the international Green Gown Award.