There is increasing disconnect between children and nature in the UK. Given that childhood nature experiences are important for the development of nature connection, well-being benefits and aspects of children’s development, mapping the existing biodiversity that children are exposed to on a daily basis in schools and their grounds is vital to identifying areas of low biodiversity and to developing strategies to increase exposure to nature. Despite children spending a large portion of time at schools, there has not yet been an in-depth, in situ assessment of the biodiversity present in school grounds. Using a sample of 14 English schools, including state-funded and non-state-funded schools, we used remote images to quantify green-space area within a 3–km buffer around (buffer greenness) and within (school greenness) each school, including the school’s grounds surrounding the buildings, and in situ images to quantify vegetation visible to children within each school’s grounds (visible vegetation). We also surveyed trees, ground plants, ground invertebrates and birds within school grounds. School greenness correlated positively with visible vegetation, but buffer greenness was not related to either school greenness or visible vegetation. Buffer greenness correlated positively with plant richness, and school greenness correlated positively with tree abundance and richness. Visible vegetation correlated positively with tree abundance and richness, maximum tree diameter at breast height, plant richness and invertebrate abundance. Non-state-funded schools had higher visible vegetation than state-funded schools. Our sample indicates that schools can support considerable biodiversity and that this is broadly consistent across state-funded and non-state-funded schools. We suggest that increasing the amount of vegetation, through planting of trees, shrubs and borders, may be the most effective method of increasing school biodiversity, as visible vegetation had effects on the greatest number of taxa.

People who live on the edges of protected areas may harvest timber to make their living from this natural forest product. Therefore, understanding timber consumption at the household level is critical for developing effective conservation policies. Previous studies have highlighted relationships between the consumption of forest products and socioeconomic status, but they have failed to examine timber consumption under cultural contexts. In this study, we interviewed 121 villagers to examine the socioeconomic profiles of timber consumers with regards to their indigenous culture in the buffer zones of Vietnam’s Bu Gia Map National Park. We found that indigenous identity, landownership, number of crops grown by villagers and proximity to markets are statistically significant for explaining the consumption of timber from natural forests. Given the high likelihood that most of this timber was collected illegally, we make several recommendations for forest managers on how to interact with villagers to improve park protection.

The shallow Lake Hornborga in southern Sweden has been used by Man for more than 9,000 years, primarily for fishing and hunting but latterly also for cattle-grazing and hay-making. The water-level of the Lake has varied considerably during climatically different periods of time. Changes between dry and wet periods have caused different vegetation-types to predominate, but have probably also effectively counterbalanced a tendency to become overgrown. During the last two centuries the water-level of the Lake has been lowered intentionally five times. Originally, the aim was to counteract spring flooding, but later the reason was to obtain more arable land. The Lake is, however, most famed for its abundance and diversity of bird-life, which is dependent on the local hydrological regime, vegetation, and land-use.

The time is ripe to step up and expand current efforts to understand the great interlocking systems of air, water, and minerals, that nourish the Earth. This is essential for a reliable assessment of the opportunities for enhancing food production on land and sea. Moreover, without vigorous action towards that goal, nations will be seriously handicapped in trying to cope with proven and suspected threats to ecosystems, and to human health and welfare, resulting from alterations in the cycles of carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulphur, and related materials.

Planning for the best use of land and its resources should take fully into consideration the long-term consequences of each type of use in order to stretch out most beneficially the well-being of society in the future, and to protect the integrity of the land and its biota. Three kinds of land-use can be distinguished for planning purposes. Reversible land-use leaves the land, after use, essentially as it was before; little or no man-induced modification remains. An example of reversible use in the United States is the designation of certain public lands as Wilderness. Terminal land-use commits the land to a chosen particular use, and any attempt at reversal requires either time-scales that are long compared with the expected lifespan of the social and political institution, or a commitment of resources that is too high for society to consider worth bearing. Examples of terminal land-use are location of metropolises and sites of toxic and/or radioactive waste disposals; by its nature the list grows monotonically. A current source of some social tension arises from the fact that Wilderness designation appears to assign a terminal-use status by legislative fiat, whereas in fact the land is being used reversibly.

A method is described of applying institutional arrangements to an individual environmentally significant area (ESA). It is assumed that an ESA has been recognized by park, wildlife, or other groups, on the basis of abiotic, biotic, and/or cultural, characteristics, as well as judgements about significance and constraints. National park, wildlife reserve, or other, institutional arrangements, may also have been suggested for the ESA. The goal is to decide whether these or other arrangements are appropriate— through analysis of relevant: (1) legislation; (2) agencies; and (3) reserve designation or land management types.