EWG awarded significant grant funding to boost engagement and education at the Ealing Beaver Project
Ealing Wildlife Group are delighted to accept a funding award of £100,000 over the next three years which has been granted as part of the HS2 Community and Environment Fund. The Ealing Beaver Project is a conservation collaboration between Ealing Wildlife Group, Citizen Zoo, Friends of Horsenden and Ealing Council. A family of five Eurasian Beavers were released into their home in Paradise Fields, Greenford in October 2023 and are thriving with two new kits born in 2024. This is a groundbreaking initiative which aims to showcase the potential for integrating nature-based solutions into urban environments.
Now, Ealing Wildlife Group seeks to further embed this project into the local and wider London community with an active plan of local engagement to educate and demonstrate how nature-led solutions can address local issues of flooding and drought, as well as biodiversity loss and access to nature.
Beavers are fantastic ecosystem engineers, as well as being very endearing creatures, and are already making a very positive contribution to the biodiversity of the site. The entire project so far has been delivered by volunteers who have given an enormous amount of their time and expertise. This grant will allow Ealing Wildlife Group to fund the recruitment of dedicated staff hours to address community engagement initiatives such as tours of the site and to provide equipment and educational materials to support these initiatives. We aim to reach thousands of local people through this grant. Ealing Wildlife Group are enormously grateful to the Fund’s panel for their award offer, and to our partners at Citizen Zoo for supporting us in our bid.
Check out some of the photos from the project (Click to enlarge)
Header image by Caroline Farrow