About
Over 25 years with my boots on the ground.
I’m Ross Wingfield. I work with farmers, estates and land managers across the UK to bring nature back into the heart of their land, in a nature-led way that works for the business too.
How I got here
After leaving University with a degree in Zoology, my working life has been spent on the land. I have been an assistant warden at Mareeba Wetlands Foundation in Australia, an aviculture warden at the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust at Arundel and a warden at National Trust Leith Hill. For ten years I was Head Ranger at Scotney Castle, managing the estate, and that is where I learned most of what I know about practical habitat management and creation in grassland, woodland and wetlands
As a Land Management Adviser for the High Weald National Landscape I worked with farmers across this amazing part of the UK to help them enhance and restore an historic and supremely natural landscape. I helped create Farm Clusters and worked on the Farming in Protected Landscapes programme. I set up and led a landscape-scale deer management project that is still running today, and chaired a monthly meeting of Natural England, the Environment Agency, the Forestry Commission, the Wildlife Trusts and the water companies.
I went on to lead nature restoration at Real Wild Estates, and was part of the founding team at RESTORE (Restored Land Ltd), where we delivered 27 nature recovery projects across a client portfolio of nearly 20,000 hectares.
At the end of last year I established Nature Works Ltd. It lets me do what I enjoy most: walking the land with the people who farm and manage it, and helping them bring back biodiversity and bio-abundance.
“A farmer for nature.”
Benedict Macdonald, author and naturalist
Recently I was referred to as a “nature fixer”, I think it is a good summary of how I work. I am nature-led, practical and can see what the next steps are, whether that is in new nature restoration project or one that has been established for some time. Sometimes you just need a fresh set of eyes to look at things.
Projects I have worked on
A few I am proud of
Beavers in Bedfordshire
The first beaver reintroduction in Bedfordshire for around 700 years.
Konik ponies
Moving a herd of Konik ponies to graze a restoration site in Wiltshire, from planning to delivery.
Green-haying in Somerset
A 30ha meadow creation project donated from a local SSSI meadow.
Severn Treescapes
The Wye to Wyre connecting nature and people, covering around 170,000 hectares, with RESTORE.
How I think about land
I start every site by asking what it would have looked like before we changed it, and what it needs to get back towards that. Then I look at what the business needs, because a plan that does not work for the farm will not last.
A lot of people think nature recovery means putting a fence round it, locking the gate and walking away. It rarely works like that. Large herbivores moving through the land, grazing, trampling and opening it up, are what keep habitats varied. Getting the grazing right is usually the first job.
Work with nature and not against it, and give advice that works on the ground, not just on paper. That is the whole approach.
Let’s walk your land.
Every project starts with a site visit. Tell me a little about your ideas and I will get back to you.