Member Article

Wonderful free gift to all wildlife lovers

Nicholas Watts MBE, owner of conservation award-winning Vine House Farm in the Lincolnshire Fens, is making his entire wildlife photography library freely available online to members of the public, with all images totally royalty-free. The collection, which totals over 10,000 images, will be released in batches with the first release having already taken place ahead of Christmas. Then, throughout 2018, the rest of the collection will be published, with a release scheduled for each month. The majority of the collection is of birds, with many of the shots taken on the 2000 plus acre Vine House Farm where Nicholas has worked tirelessly for many decades to reverse the trend of farmland bird decline. His conservation efforts have involved a very wide range of measures including hedgerow planting, the creation of numerous ponds, wild flower meadows and the restoration of old farm buildings for barn owls to nest in together, as well as running the family bird food business.

In August, Northumberland Wildlife Trust in this region, celebrated a flourishing 10 year partnership with Nicholas who has donated over £1,250,000 of his Vine House Farm sales to all 47 UK wildlife trusts, in support of wildlife conservation across the country.

Nicholas says: “The main reason I wanted my collection of photographs to be freely available to anyone, is that it’s a practical way of raising awareness of the importance of wildlife and the environment and I hope my farming work will inspire more people, especially the younger generation, to take up nature photography.”
Speaking of this very generous gift, Mike Pratt, Northumberland Wildlife Trust Chief Executive said: “The Watts family are true nature conservation leaders, and their incredible long-term support of Northumberland Wildlife Trust and the other 46 wildlife trusts has enabled us all to feed the birds in this country.

“Now, the selfless donation of online photoraphs will hopefully help to connect people with the natural world, which will, in turn, benefit our precious wildlife and wild places.”

The first batch of images from Nicholas’ photo collection is available now from The Vine House Farm website: https://www.vinehousefarm.co.uk/blog/2017/12/12/royalty-free-wild-bird-photos/

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Northumberland Wildlife Trust .