We are delighted to announce that UKCEH has secured funding from The National Archives to explore how a nationally significant collection of land-use and woodland records can be preserved, catalogued and digitised, helping safeguard decades of environmental knowledge for future generations.
The Land Use/Woodlands Collection project will scope the preservation and digitisation of records documenting changes in the UK's landscapes and woodlands since the mid-20th century. The project will identify priorities, risks and resource requirements, creating a roadmap for a long-term digital archive programme.
The collection is part of UKCEH's extensive archive of environmental research and monitoring records, which has been built over decades and contains invaluable evidence of how the UK's natural environment has changed over time.
Unlocking an extraordinary ecological legacy
The Land Use/Woodlands collection includes field notebooks, maps, laboratory records, photographs, logbooks, data sheets and associated samples gathered by pioneering ecologists and environmental scientists.
These records provide a detailed picture of changes in Britain's landscapes and woodlands dating back to the 1950s, offering an important resource for understanding long-term environmental change and informing future research, policy and conservation decisions.
Claire Wood, Information Scientist at UKCEH, said:
"This award gives us a fantastic opportunity to unlock the potential of an extraordinary ecological legacy in terms of Britain's woodland research. Drawing on extensive data and information collected by pioneering ecologists since the 1950s, and carefully curated by UKCEH and its predecessor organisations, this invaluable archive will provide new insights to help address today's environmental challenges."
Preserving vulnerable scientific heritage
While the collection has long supported scientific research, much of the material remains accessible only in physical formats and is vulnerable to deterioration over time. The funding will enable UKCEH to undertake a structured scoping exercise to determine which records should be prioritised for preservation and digitisation, assess technical and staffing requirements, and develop a clear plan for establishing a dedicated digital archive.
The project's aim is not only to protect valuable scientific heritage but also to make it more accessible to researchers, students, local communities and the wider public. Digitisation will help unlock previously inaccessible information, enabling new analysis of long-term environmental change while allowing people to explore historical records, photographs and evidence documenting how familiar landscapes have evolved over the past 70 years.
Securing funding through Archives Revealed, the UK's only grant programme dedicated to cataloguing and unlocking archival collections, is a significant achievement. The success reflects the collaborative efforts of colleagues across UKCEH, with Julia Browne and the Archives team whose expertise was central to securing this highly competitive funding and ensuring successful delivery of the project.
The award was made by The National Archives through the Archives Revealed Scoping Grant Fund. Archives Revealed is supported by The National Lottery Heritage Fund, The National Archives, the Pilgrim Trust and the Wolfson Foundation.
A wider environmental archive
The Land Use/Woodlands collection forms part of a much broader UKCEH archive held within UKCEH’s Science Support Unit in Lancaster. The Archive Monitor database currently contains almost 2,900 active entries, including project reports, field and laboratory notebooks, physical samples and records from major long-term monitoring programmes such as Countryside Survey and the Environment and Rural Affairs Monitoring and Modelling Programme (ERAMMP).
The archive also contains statutory and regulatory documentation, staff publications, historical maps, photographs, slides and corporate records, alongside important, donated collections including the Adam Watson Archive and the John Rodwell Collection. Together, these materials provide a unique record of environmental research in the UK and the work of UKCEH and its predecessor organisations over many decades.
Looking to the future
The Land Use/Woodlands Collection project represents the first step towards a longer-term programme to preserve and improve access to UKCEH's scientific archives. By creating a roadmap for future digitisation, UKCEH will help ensure that decades of environmental knowledge remain available and useful for scientists, policymakers and the public, while opening new opportunities for research, learning and engagement with the UK's environmental history.
Read more about UKCEH Library and Archives Services here.
