Posted on: 6th July 2023

The results come from a recent nature-count conducted by local communities from 3 to 11 June 2023. 

Volunteers from across the country took part in Churches Count on Nature, an opportunity for local communities to come together to record the wildlife found in churchyards and burial grounds. Part of Love Your Burial Ground Week, it was held by the Church of England in collaboration with Caring for God's Acre, the Church in Wales and A Rocha UK. 

Having escaped the plough, development, and the intensive use of chemicals for centuries, churchyards host an abundance of wildlife; often featuring flower-rich grassland and lichen-encrusted memorials, as well as being home to most of the ancient yew trees in the UK. Participants conducted a survey of the wildlife in their chosen patch and recorded the numbers and types of plants, insects and animals found there. 

Liam Taylor, a data manager at Caring for God’s Acre, said of this year’s findings: “There is a tremendous amount of diversity in the species recorded - over 150 different taxa [groups within species]. So far, the records coming in show the top invertebrates spotted to be bumblebees, ladybirds and aphids. 

Read more here.