Wilder Kent Blog

The county of Kent is blessed with an extensive coastal and intertidal environment comprising elements of the eastern Thames Estuary, the southern North Sea and the English Channel. In north-east Kent, located between the towns of Whitstable and Deal, is the North East Kent Marine Protected Area (NEKMPA) which includes the previously designated North East Kent European Marine Site, the Thanet Coast Marine Conservation Zone and Sandwich & Pegwell Bay National Nature Reserve.

Join your Talk on the Wild Side host, Rob Smith, for a journey through Marden's farms and gardens - where farmers, scientists, and keen birders are working together to make space for the rare turtle fove.

In the last fifty years, both nightingales and turtle doves have suffered a population decline of over 90%. The usual threats of habitat degradation and climate change are partly to blame, but these two species are also at risk from a few more specific challenges.

Join Coexistence Support Officer, Julia Brant, for a day at Rother Woods as part of the South East Pine Marten Restoration Project.

The wettest winters and springs on record have had at least one benefit. The ponds and pools across Hothfield Heathlands are full of water!

Rob Smith heads to Moat Farm Kent to visit a farmer who's lucky enough to live in a stronghold of a rare and elusive bird species - the nightingale. Find out the facts about Nightingales, listen to their beautiful song and learn how Michael Bax makes sure they have the right habitat to keep coming back year after year.

On 19th May one hundred years ago, the first outdoors broadcast by the BBC was of professional cellist Beatrice Harrison playing to and with nightingales in the garden of her Surrey home. Around a million listeners tuned in to the midnight broadcast, and she performed for similar outdoor broadcasts over the next twelve years.

Now what's the difference between a weasel and a stoat? Well, of course one is weaselly recognised while the other one is stoatally different. But could you tell a pine marten from either of them?