CLIMATE CHANGE

"The last time the UK's wildlife faced a challenge on this scale was at the end of the last ice age. We need to find ways to help our wildlife become more resilient to the trials it faces in the 21st century. We must now work on a landscape scale if we are to give wildlife a chance and allow future generations to enjoy nature as we have." Sir David Attenborough.

Climate change threatens to bring massive waves of species extinctions around the world. Those waves will hit Shropshire's wildlife, as surely as they will the polar bears in the Arctic. Finding ways for wildlife to adapt to the effects of hotter, drier summers and warmer, wetter winters is a mighty challenge.

Reduction, deterioration and fragmentation of habitats - loss of flower-rich meadows, wetlands, heathland, woodland and so on - has already made many kinds of wildlife vulnerable. Reversing those changes and creating landscape-scale opportunities for wild creatures and plants is now even more necessary for the survival of wild species than ever. This doesn't mean turning the whole of Shropshire into a nature reserve. What it will involve is working with a wide range of landowners, both public and private, to restore networks of different habitats linked together via well-managed hedgerows, verges, river valleys and other connecting wildlife corridors.

This is nothing new. Projects such as Back to purple, the heathland restoration scheme on the Stiperstones, have been working to achieve this for years. The Wrekin Forest project is starting in this direction now. But we need to extend the idea to include areas such as the Meres and Mosses region in north Shropshire and the Oswestry Hills and to continue the excellent work achieved in south Shropshire through the Blue Remembered Hills project. We are also currently working on a regional scale plan with other Wildlife Trusts in the West Midlands.

The argument is over on climate change and international treaties will, in time, be forged to reduce emissions. But it's a painfully slow process, involving much wrangling and resistance. The good thing is that individually, everyone can make changes now. Quite simply, do anything you can to avoid the burning of fossil fuels.

PEAT BOGS THREATENED: an example of how Shropshire's wildlife is likely to be affected by climate change

Predictions of longer, hotter summers spell bad news for peat bogs, such as the Fenn's, Whixall & Bettisfield mosses and the Trust's reserve, Wem Moss. Sphagnum moss, which provides the living surface of the bog, will become stressed, leading to the drying out of pools. Dragonflies such as the white-faced darter and that huge creature, the raft spider will be lost, along with many kinds of plant such as bog asphodel, bog rosemary and the carnivorous sundew species.

The problem might be less intense were the bogs not already damaged by extensive peat cutting (in the case of Fenn's Whixall & Bettisfield mosses) and by the effects of drainage schemes on surrounding farmland in the case of Wem Moss. As the peat dries out, other plants and trees move in at the expense of the peat bog species. The spread of common heather (which favours drier areas) and loss of cross-leaved heath (which needs wetter conditions) might not seem so very drastic a change. But for the large heath butterfly it means doom. Cross-leaved heath, from which the large heath gathers its nectar, flowers in June, while common heather does not bloom until August - September, when the butterfly is long gone.

The drying out of bogs has another serious consequence. Millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide are locked up within the peat. As it dries out and starts to decompose, both carbon dioxide and methane are released in huge quantities. Fires, too will release the gases and dried-up peat bogs are all too easily set alight. It is estimated that around 500 billion tonnes of carbon is locked up in the world's bogs. Never has it been more crucial that these ancient habitats should be kept soaking wet and unexploited.

So, there's another compelling reason for gardeners and landscapers everywhere not to buy peat-based compost.