Wildwood Trust: We must act NOW to save them!

One donation, twice the impact to save the pine marten!

View in your browser

We must act now to save them!

The beautiful, but extremely elusive pine marten was once widespread. Sadly, centuries of persecution along with the disappearance of their habitat, has led this beautiful animal to become perilously close to extinction, which is why we must act now, before it's too late!

For one week only, from 12pm today - 12pm Tuesday 10th December, all donations given through the Big Give will be DOUBLED! This means your donation will make twice the difference towards our vital conservation work to save the pine marten.

Double your donation

Watch this incredibly rare footage of a pine marten giving birth and find out more about the challenges faced with breeding the pine marten in captivity. Donations to support this vital work will be DOUBLED, so please don't delay, donate today and make even more of a difference for these extremely endangered animals.

Double your donation

Wildwood is very proud of our achievements to date in pine marten conservation, having already bred twelve pine marten in captivity, but we urgently need your help to replace Wildwood's facilities for breeding them. The existing breeding enclosures have become severely degraded over time and are desperately in need of a complete rebuild to ensure we can continue this vital work.

Your donation will help us to rebuild the enclosures, giving us the opportunity to build on our current knowledge and ensure a continued successful breeding programme. We will refine the tunnel system and build a range of specially designed nesting boxes to encourage them to breed.

A camera system will be installed within the tunnels and nest boxes giving us the unique opportunity of monitoring the pine marten breeding 24 hours a day without causing them any undue, unnecessary stress or disturbance. Our aspiration is to include a research area within the new enclosures to allow ongoing research into the diet of pine marten enabling us to share this information with other conservation organisations in the future.

We also need to source and introduce new pine martens to those already at Wildwood to improve our breeding programme further. A widely varied gene pool is vital to ensure successful breeding of healthy pine marten in captivity and this will massively increase their chances of being able to recover their numbers in the long term. Importing new animals can be a very expensive process with high transportation costs and vets bills, so your donation really will help us to do so much more.

Double your donation

The pine martens' recovery in the UK could help to restore the country's natural balance, as with all native species, the pine marten play an important role in the ecosystem. They disperse seeds, lower the risk of diseases by removing carrion, and studies have shown that they could also provide a natural way of reducing grey squirrel numbers, helping red squirrels to re-establish their populations.

Double your donation

All donations do have to be processed through the Big Give website to unlock the match funds available, but if you're unable to make a donation online, please call 01227 712111 and we will be happy to help you. Alternatively, you can make a donation when you visit the park or post a cheque, but these donations will not be doubled.

Thank you in advance for your continued support and please don't hesitate to email us if you have any questions relating to this appeal.