HLF can fund far more than just castles and buildings. We can fund nature, habitats, species, and amazing places like the ancient woodlands of Greno Woods, featured in a new film about Yorkshire’s natural heritage, a microcosm of nature in the UK.

Over the last 18 months we’ve been promoting the glorious natural heritage of Yorkshire and the Humber.  We want to encourage groups to come forward with project ideas looking at the natural environment through our ‘Yorkshire’s Back Garden’ campaign. Whether it’s looking at the rich wildlife along the Humber Estuary, the incredible landscapes of the Moors or the Dales, or looking at the insects and plants on your street or your local park, we’d like to hear from groups interested in running natural heritage projects, and help connect local people and communities to the natural world around them.

Since September 2015 we’ve seen some amazing ideas from organisations entirely new to HLF, and awarded over £3.2million for projects ranging from monitoring bats, birds and beetles, through re-populating the River Don with Salmon, to restoring ornamental gardens.

Connecting people to natural heritage

There is so much to explore with the natural heritage of Yorkshire, Humberside and North Lincolnshire, and we are looking to connect people to the nature that is on their doorstep, whether that is local green spaces, burial grounds and churchyards, verges or the river bank. There are plenty of havens for wildlife that you might walk past every day or are hidden from us.

We want to encourage applications for funding from all champions of natural heritage, particularly small, local and community groups with projects that help raise awareness of the wildlife and nature to be found close to home.

Need inspiration or advice? Contact the development team at HLF Yorkshire and the Humber for more information.

To keep up to date with the campaign, follow us on Twitter and look out for the hashtag #HLFnature.