Q&A with Alan Bowley, co-founder of the Great Fen project
Having grown-up within sight of the South Downs, Alan Bowley started worked as a Nature Conservancy Council warden of the East Sussex chalk grassland national nature reserves (NNR) in 1978, after two years at Tring Reservoirs and a spell travelling across Africa.
He also advised on the management of wetland Sites
of Special Scientific Interest such as Nene
Washes and represented Natural
England on the Wicken Fen Management Committee during the
development of the “Wicken Vision”.
Alan initiated the Fen Management Network across a
range of conservation organisations in East Anglia, and in 2010 gained a Diploma
in Ecology and Conservation from the University of London.
In 2001 Alan was responsible for co-founding the Great Fen project with the Wildlife Trust
and Environment
Agency and has worked closely with all partners throughout the life of the project.
He represented the Great Fen at World Wetlands Day
in 2008 and at the 2009 conference of “Wild Europe”
in Brussels, and has made wildlife management study tours of the Netherlands,
Belgium and Germany.
Alan has written widely about conservation management and the Great Fen and given many talks and lectures on wetland management.
In 2019 he published his book The
Great Fen: A Journey Through Time. This explores how the
Cambridgeshire fenland has evolved through population growth, war, drainage and
cultivation to the landscape of today.
In 2016, Alan moved to Dorset where he continues to be involved in conservation and promoting closer links between people and the natural world.
Alan’s web site can be accessed here. This includes a PowerPoint of a presentation he
gave about his book earlier this year.
The Q&A begins …
Q: The Great Fen project was launched in 2002. This was during your time as senior reserves manage at Woodwalton Fen and Holme Fen and I believe you were instrumental in the development of the plan. This is an open-ended project aimed at connecting the two separate fens to form a single, enriched fen landscape that will cover 14 square miles between Peterborough and Huntingdon. The plan includes the controversial idea of buying arable land and turning it into new natural habitat.
As I understand it, the project was born
out of a realisation that maintaining fragmented nature reserves cannot
adequately address the problems of wildlife decline and biodiversity. Can you
say more about why it was concluded that this new approach is needed?
A: The drive for increased
productivity in food production in the post-war years contributed to enormous
losses of wetland, meadow and woodland habitat across the UK. Successive
governments rewarded this process by an extravagant system of subsidies and
agricultural research sponsored by a well-funded Ministry of Agriculture,
fisheries and Food.
By contrast, the government’s own Nature Conservancy
(now Natural England with separate agencies for Scotland and Wales) was
crucially under-funded and relied almost entirely on voluntary schemes with
land-users to protect vulnerable wildlife habitats.
This resulted in only a small selection of sites being
protected as nature reserves or Sites of Special Scientific Interest. These
were almost always fragments of once much bigger landscapes and ecosystems and
as such rarely had the capacity to sustain the natural processes essential for
a rich ecological system.
While expensive micro-management (‘gardening’) was often
successful, it was obvious that the long-term health of these ‘flowerpots’ was doubtful.
Throughout the 1980’s and ‘90’s more and more people came to the view that the
whole philosophy of small ‘protected sites’ had to change and the Great Fen and
the Wicken Vision were the first of these.
Q: The National Trust’s Wicken Fen nature
reserve had adopted a similar approach to the Great Fen in 1999, when it launched the Wicken
Fen Vision. This is a 100-year plan “to create
a diverse landscape for wildlife and people” that will see the size of the
nature reserve increase to 53 square kilometres, and extend southwards to the
edge of Cambridge, including Anglesey
Abbey and Stow-cum-Quy Fen.
You were also on the Wicken Fen Management Committee when the vision was
developed.
Was it difficult to get buy-in to this new
more ambitious approach and what challenges to implementation of the Great Fen
and Wicken Fen Vision projects have been faced? How successful have they been
to date?
A: Certainly there was
opposition from the agricultural lobby but also incredulity from many in the conservation
movement.
You see, the whole thrust of nature conservation had
been based on detailed ecological classification of sites with a prescribed
account of their value in terms of habitats and species. Management objectives
were aimed at perpetuating specific features for which the site had been
nominated. There was little room to account for the vagaries of Nature in its
rawest form, little account taken of the natural cycles.
So when the National Trust and the Great Fen partners
proposed a system of changing land-use to one which would allow natural
processes to re-assert themselves, without prescribed outcomes, there was
consternation at this ‘non-scientific approach’.
Wicken and Great Fen have taken slightly different
routes. Great Fen is more about working with farmers and experimenting with
wetland agriculture, whereas Wicken has concentrated more on establishing a
herd of ‘wild’ horses and native cattle.
Both have their merits and have undoubtedly seeded the recent flurry of ‘re-wilding’ projects across the UK.
Lawton Report
Q: I assume this new thinking has been accepted in principle at government level. In 2010 a government-commissioned panel chaired by Sir John Lawton published a report calling for “a coherent and resilient ecological network” in which both “the network and its component sites” are of adequate size to be effective and that there should be buffer zones and “wildlife corridors” between the sites. Subsequently, DEFRA published a White Paper promising “more, bigger, better and joined” terrestrial wildlife sites.
Is there now a widespread consensus on the
need for this more ambitious and joined up approach to conservation and nature
reserves, or are there still competing views on the best way forward? If so,
what are these competing views?
A: The Lawton report (Making
Space for Nature) was a turning-point. Successive ministers and other leaders
had visited the Great Fen in droves, and many were convinced that this was the
way forward, but the opposition on the grounds of agricultural and economic
growth was very strong and the value of functioning ecosystems was widely
misunderstood.
Fenland in particular was, in the words of Oliver Rackham
(author of The History
of the Countryside): “a somewhat precarious triumph of
technology over a deteriorating situation, made possible by vigilance,
expensive repairs and an ever-increasing input of energy”.
Written in 1986, I think this highlights how long it
took for politicians and other influencers to accept the non-human world as a
vital support to our existence, rather than a nice thing to look at on a Sunday
afternoon.
Lawton catapulted the real issues onto the public
stage and certainly changed the way that many people approached the subject. He
stressed that it could be far more expensive to ignore the deterioration of the
environment than to do something about it and that it was crucial to
‘re-nature’ large parts of Britain.
There is still, however, a gulf of understanding
between ‘climate’ issues such as energy and the conservation of wild places.
Q: In terms of government commitment to
implementation of the Lawton proposals I note that five years after the report
was published (2015) landscape consultancy The Landmark Practice complained:
“there is little evidence to suggest political appetite to deliver Lawton’s key
tenets.” It added that there has also been a failure to embed the objectives of
the White Paper into all government development policy and that “the lack of
integration between sectorial policies prevents intelligent implementation.”
I suspect some might argue that the way
HS2 is being implemented demonstrates the nature of these problems: both the Woodland
Trust and the Wildlife
Trusts have expressed concerns about the damage
that HS2 will do to the natural environment and biodiversity.
However, when it comes to nature reserves
would you say the recommendations of the Lawton Report are now being actively
supported by government and is it showing a commitment to the promises made in
the White Paper?
A: I wish I could say the
recommendations have been acted on, but I think it’s fair to say the answer is
still No.
How seriously government took the issue is highlighted
by the fact that Lawton thought it necessary to write to the prime minister in
2020 stating that:
“there has been far too little progress towards establishing the ‘more
bigger better and joined’ spaces for nature called for in the report. This is
bad for wildlife but also bad for people…wildlife losses represent a decline in
resilience of the ecosystems upon which we depend and a loss of experience and
joy”.
Having said that, there is no doubt that the
principles of moving towards bigger and more robust spaces for Nature have been
taken very much to heart by many land-owners and private and public bodies.
‘Re-wilding’ is now a very current theme, and while that
may not always be a helpful term, the fact that large areas of land are now
being managed for wildlife as well as for people must be celebrated.
Despite the recent appointment of a committed conservationist [Tony Juniper] to be chair of Natural England, however, its poor resourcing speaks volumes about the government’s true commitment. Policies are useless without practice.
More nuanced and complex
Q: Last year you published an excellent book called The Great Fen: A Journey Through Time. This is not just about the Great Fen but discusses the project in the context of the wider fenland and its archaeology, geography, wildlife, and ecology – all set against the backdrop of history, starting way back at the ice age and travelling through the Roman, Viking and Norman periods, before moving on to the draining of the fens and the subsequent “rise of the campaigners”, which saw the setting up of conservation groups like the RSPB and the Wildlife Trusts and the emergence of what you call “new naturalists” like Charles Rothschild (who, amongst other things, funded the acquisition of the first parcel of land at Wicken Fen).
Your book gives the reader a far more
nuanced and complex picture of the fens and their history than most books I
have read on the topic. In doing the research to write the book did you find
your views about the fens, and the area’s history and future, change in any
way? If so, in what way?
A: Oh yes definitely. I had
always recognised the need to step back and view the nature reserves and the
wider project in the context of landscape changes, but I never intended to go
so far back in time.
What I discovered was that there have been three key factors which have resulted in the landscape and isolated pockets of nature which we see today:
- Climate change – this has been happening ever since the last glaciation 12,000 years ago and people had to adapt to survive.
- Population growth – the need to feed more mouths.
- Technological development – from stone axes to electric pumps, this has given us the ability to make dramatic alterations to the landscape.
The fens have only been wet for about 5-6,000 years
and during that period their wetness has fluctuated. What impressed me most was
the resilience of the many cultures, immigrants and invaders who have occupied
the fenland over that time.
You cannot view the fens purely in terms of their
ecology – people are central to it all. They have used the land and water to
suit their needs at their time.
The great drainage of the 16th century was as much a part of that as the
water people living amongst the great eel and beaver communities in
pre-medieval times.
Q: In a talk you gave about
your book earlier this year you said you are often asked what the fens used to
look like. The answer to that question, you added, depends on how far back you
look. As I understand it, your point is that the natural landscape changes all
the time and the fens landscape has changed more than most. It also means that
the flora and fauna that inhabit the landscape change over time.
And as you say, the fens have dried and been re-flooded at different times throughout history. We have also seen sea levels rise inexorably. At the end of the ice age, for instance, the sea was at least 70m lower than it is today, and while the fenland was warmer and drier during the Roman occupation, by the time the Romans left it had flooded.
If I understand correctly, you also see climate change as a constant, and human activity as just one of the causal factors, and a relatively recent one at that. While this offers a more nuanced picture, I guess it could provide climate change deniers with ammunition to downplay or dismiss the importance of human activity in causing climate change.
How would you characterise the role that humans have played, and are playing,
in climate change, and in what ways, and to what degree, do you believe that
nature reserves can protect and preserve wildlife and the natural environment
from the negative aspects of climate change, both in the near and long term?
A: That is a very good question. I do believe that many folk have no idea
that the climate has fluctuated considerably over millions of years. The fact
that the ice-caps are currently confined to the poles is because there has been
gradual warming for 12,000 years.
You might even argue that humans played a part in that – the great
forests were hugely depleted even before the Romans came and fen drainage and
exposure of the peat has released enormous amounts of CO2 over the last 5
centuries.
The arguments for the acceleration in climate change
today, however, are quite different – now it’s all about C02 and other gases being
released as a result of modern living, and at a rate not seen for millions of years.
Added to that, warming of the permafrost and seas has the potential to release
devastating amounts of methane – an even more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2.
Scientific data shows a conclusive correlation between
the start of the industrial age in the 19th century with the
beginning of a rise in CO2 ‘greenhouse gas’ emissions. It has been shown that
‘natural’ changes in climate cannot possibly have produced that effect.
Changes in climate which affect crop yields, flooding and damaging
weather fluctuations have the potential to cause misery to many millions of
people – particularly those in low-lying areas and often the poorest.
Safeguarding remaining ecosystems (particularly peatlands) has beyond
question the greatest potential to prevent catastrophe. Ceasing exposure of the
Great Fen peat alone would save in excess of 350,000 tons of CO2 a year.
No going back
Q: I think people tend to romanticise the fens. I also wonder whether some assume we can recover more of what has been lost than is possible. I suspect, for instance, that some believe we can re-create places like Whittlesey Mere. I doubt this is possible, not least because in environmental terms “no site is an island”. I am struck, for instance, that in his book England’s Lost Lake, Paul Middleton suggests that the progressive draining of the fens during the 17th and 18th centuries meant that by the time William Wells and other local landowners brought the Appold centrifugal pump into the Whittlesey Mere in 1851 the lake was already shrinking. Indeed, in 1826, Middleton says, it had temporarily dried up.
This suggests to me that the arrival of
the centrifugal pump simply completed a process that had become inevitable as a
result of what was happening elsewhere across the fens. Would I be right to
think that? And does it suggest that unless we are prepared to see substantial
change to the fenland landscape – with significant implications for the towns
of Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire – the fens can only be rewilded in a very
limited way.
A: Yes I would agree,
there is no possibility of ‘going back’ so we have to work with what we have to
create the landscapes we wish to have.
That said, depending on how high sea levels rise, there may well have to be a
serious re-think of how low-lying settlements are going to adapt.
Re-establishing something akin to natural wetlands to manage excess water seems
to me to be a pragmatic way to protect and enhance both human and wildlife
communities.
Q: Most people who write about the fens
today tend to deprecate the fact that the area was drained. Things are very
rarely black and white of course: I wonder what in your view are the pros and
cons of the fens having been drained?
A: Well it seemed to be the
right thing to do at the time. The population was growing, more food was needed,
and society was becoming more ‘sophisticated’, in that people were becoming more
urban in their thinking so that untamed nature was not considered desirable.
It’s easy to sit back and tut-tut from our viewpoint –
what is driving the deforestation of South America and Indonesia is just the
same as why the fens were drained.
Q: What do you think was most distinctive
about the fens historically? And in what ways are the fens still special and
why?
A: The people are and always
have been resilient and independent. They developed a system of living amongst
the waters which is rather reminiscent of the few remaining indigenous
populations of the Amazon rainforest. They understood and lived with the land
and water, instead of trying to tame it to their will.
Q: What would you say have been the three
most significant events for the fens and its inhabitants? And who would you say
have been the three people who have had the most impact on the fens and/or the
wider world?
A: The three events I would
point to are the dissolution of the monasteries in 1530’s and land coming onto
the open market as a result; the erection of the Holme Fen Post in 1848; and the
preservation of Wicken and the Great Fen project.
Better to adapt
Q: In your book you say that bitterns and business can live together. Farmers nevertheless surely face challenges. With the government committed to restoring peatland, and pushing for alternative farming methods, it might seem likely that some farmers could struggle to survive.
I am also mindful of the fact that one
farmer I spoke to recently complained that when land near a nature reserve
comes up for sale local farmers are not able to compete with what he called
“the bottomless funds” of organisations like the National Trust. He added that
farmers find it very disheartening to see the condition that prime farmland is
in a few years after it has been bought by a reserve.
This surely misunderstands the purpose of
projects like the Great Fen and the Wicken Fen Vision, but I think it indicates
that there are testing communication issues ahead, and that farmers are going
to need help and support. How can these issues best be handled?
A: Change always brings
uncertainty. Confronting uncomfortable issues is also difficult for those
directly involved.
I understand the views expressed, but the bald fact is
that the peat won’t be around for much longer under pump-drained arable
farming, so it is better to adapt now rather than wait for the inevitable. That
is why Great Fen is working on developing ‘wetland
farming’.
We need to ‘re-calibrate’ the way we view the natural
resources available to us. Intensive farming on the fens has destroyed its very
fabric because society had chosen to ignore how we are PART of the natural
world, not in opposition to it.
The real problem, of course, is that there are more
and more mouths to feed. But that means it is even more important to work with nature to
produce our food.
Q: Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions.
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